Hunter had posted a sign on the lobby door that said, BACK IN AN HOUR, wisely disappearing to avoid getting involved after he’d called to warn her. Which meant that no one witnessed what happened. No one saw her shoot the gun or saw them drive off in the agent’s car. With luck, the backup team would assume the plan was still in place, that the agent was taking a break to relieve himself or to grab a bite to eat and that she and Hadley were still asleep in their rooms.
Only after precious time had passed would they realize something was wrong—the agent not returning their calls and the hotel too quiet.
“You okay?” Mattie says beside her.
“Huh? Yeah.” She forces a reassuring smile to her face as she tosses a package of socks into the shopping cart. She feels Mattie’s stress, and Skipper has been on the brink of losing it all morning.
She leads them to the computer department, where she logs onto the internet and researches hotels that accept cash deposits, along with possible routes into Canada. She doesn’t have a passport, but she knows there are other ways to cross the border.
When she’s done, Skipper says, “Can I get a uniform now?”
“I can take him,” Mattie offers. “They probably have baseball pants and team T-shirts and hats.”
“We’ll all go,” Grace says. She grabs a burner phone from the endcap, since Hadley’s been using hers, then follows them toward the boys’ department.
“Is there anything else you need?” she asks Mattie.
“Do you mind if I buy a book?” she answers shyly.
The answer surprises Grace. “Of course not.”
They don’t have any Colorado Rockies stuff, but they find gray baseball pants, blue socks, a Dodgers T-shirt, and a matching Dodgers hat, which Skipper proudly calls his travel uniform.
In the book department, Grace expects Mattie to choose something from the Young Adult section or from the display featuring the Game of Thrones series. Instead she goes to the tiny “Timeless” section and smiles when she spots a book with the image of a frizzy-haired man wearing an ascot on the cover. She tosses it in the cart.
It takes Grace a second to remember why the book looks familiar, and the answer comes to her along with confusion. She can’t fathom what a fourteen-year-old, twenty-first-century girl could possibly find entertaining about the story of Candide, a book Grace CliffsNoted in high school in order to pass ninth-grade English.
Mattie smiles again when she puts the book on the conveyor belt, clearly excited.
“Really?” Grace says. “It’s that good?” From what Grace can recall, the story is about a depressing series of misadventures in which everyone dies.
“So good,” Mattie says, her face lit up. “The main character, this guy Candide, he’s hilarious. It’s like he doesn’t get it. His life totally sucks. It sucks and it sucks and it sucks. Everywhere he goes and everything he does turns out bad, but he just keeps trudging forward with this stupid, ridiculous optimism, convinced that it’s all happening for a reason, when really it’s just happening because life sucks. It’s completely moronic, but you’ve gotta love him for it. He just totally doesn’t get it.”
Mattie returns to putting things on the conveyor belt, a smirk on her face, and though Grace has never read a book for pleasure in her life, she thinks she might at some point read that one.
They leave Walmart and go to Peggy Sue’s Diner to “load the bases,” as Skipper says.
Afterward, her stomach bloated from inhaling a tall stack of pancakes, two eggs, and half a slab of bacon, Grace is so tired she’s afraid she might collapse. The temperature is now in the hundreds, and the combination of the heat and their early-morning start is making her woozy.
She decides to take a short rest before they continue on. She parks in the shade and moves Miles to the front to give Mattie and Skipper more room. The air conditioner whirs at full force and makes it almost comfortable. Mattie opens her book. Skipper plays on his computer game.
“First Base?” Skipper says as Grace’s eyes grow heavy.
“Huh?”
“Can you help me make a trade on my fantasy team? I want Wolters, and Coach has him.”
“Sure. Is he catching on Tuesday?”
“I think so.”
On and on they talk about Skipper’s fantasy team and the trades he wants to make before the game, and Grace drifts away to the strong wish that somehow they’ll make it to the game and that somehow it will all work out.
She and Miles won’t be with them. Her plan is to ditch this car for another, then drive them all to Bakersfield. From there, the Torellis will be on their own. She and Miles will head to Canada and then, God willing, find their way to a nonextradition country. She and Virginia talked about it once, hypothetically discussing becoming jewel thieves and where they would escape to with their riches. They decided on either Indonesia or the Maldives, though Virginia argued for Dubai or one of the countries near South Africa, since almost everyone in those places speaks English.
Forty minutes later, she wakes to Mattie leaning forward, staring at her.
“What?” she says, self-conscious of how she must have looked sleeping. She raises the seat and wipes her mouth for drool.
“Teach me to drive,” Mattie blurts.
“What?”
“Think about it. It makes sense. My mom can’t drive, and you being the only driver is too much. In nine months, I’d be getting my permit anyway—”
Grace holds up her hand, stopping her, and Mattie swallows back the rest of what she was going to say as she looks at Grace through her eyebrows.
Grace feels her stress. She remembers all too well what it’s like to be fourteen and to have your life ripped out from under you and to be terrified of what is to come. Fourteen, a strange age, almost fully formed, but not quite, still young enough to be at the mercy of others, even when they don’t necessarily have your best interests at heart.
Mattie looks like she is going to burst an artery, her eyes bulging as she waits for Grace to answer.
“What would your mom say?” Grace says.
“She’s not here,” Mattie answers, almost making Grace smile, the remark a lot like something Grace would say.
She swallows back her grin as she thinks about it, the idea not entirely terrible. If Mattie could drive, it would definitely give the Torellis more of a chance.
“Okay,” she says, and Mattie nearly yips, then grabs for the door.
“Not so fast,” Grace says. “Learn by listening and watching, and if you do good, I’ll consider letting you behind the wheel.”
Mattie’s mouth opens to protest; then wisely she snaps it shut, and again Grace smiles to herself. She likes this kid. She really does.
Mattie moves Miles to the back, then climbs into the passenger seat.
“Foot on the brake when you’re in park,” Grace says. She points to her foot. “Middle pedal. Driving is a one-footed affair. Got it?”
Mattie nods.
“Two hands on the wheel. Ten and two, like a clock. Mirrors. Three of them. You use all three, and you use them twice.”
Mattie nods again, her brow furrowed in fierce concentration, and Grace straightens in her seat, feeling a great responsibility for what she is doing—teaching something to someone, something Grace has never done.
33
HADLEY
For the first hour, Hadley was upset. For the second, she was nervous, her energy buzzing and her heart lurching with every move the agent made. He had given up on trying to convince her to turn herself in, and she was certain he was going to try to escape.
After the third hour, her adrenaline petered out, and her injured ankle, which had been throbbing, fell asleep, the pins-and-needles sensation almost as uncomfortable as the pain. Then, in the fourth hour, she became hungry, her stomach growling as her temples throbbed with a headache.
The hour after, the agent fell asleep, and now he is snoring lightly, his mouth hanging open and his head bent uncomfortably against the wall.
She hates that he is so nice. It makes her feel that much worse for what they’re doing. He seems genuinely concerned about them, like he really wants to help, but she can’t go to jail. Neither can Grace. It’s simply not possible.
She stares at the skull in the display case. She has named him Fred. She makes up stories about his life and his wife and his family. She has decided he was a good man and very funny. After all, it looks like he is smiling despite only a few of his teeth remaining.
The agent stirs and shifts position. She watches as his head lolls to the other side. He is not terrible looking, a bit gruff, but also rugged—broad shouldered with thick, Popeye-like forearms. The shadow of beard that lines his jaw is two shades darker than his cinnamon hair, and his long nose is slightly bent—broken from being an athlete, a fighter, or both. His hair is cut short and sticks up straight, a style probably left over from his military days.
Overall, he looks like a good all-American man—the kind who grew up calling his mom ma’am and his dad sir and who always holds the door open for a woman and says God bless you when someone sneezes—and she likes him very much for that. He’s the kind of man her father would have approved of and her mother would have loved. A man completely different from the one she chose.
She looks away and toward the clock above the door. It’s nearly noon, and she’s worried. Grace and the kids have been gone a long time.
The agent shifts again, mumbles something that sounds like “dog,” then resumes his heavy breathing, and she returns to her worrying and staring at the clock.
When it reaches one, her concern gives way to intense focus on her bladder. She really needs to pee. She looks again at the agent. His eyes are still closed, but something has changed, an altered rhythm to his breaths.
“I need to pee,” she says.
His eyes snap open, and a smile of relief crosses his face. “Me too.”
34
MARK
They are laughing. It’s very comical. Torelli was so concerned Mark would try to make a break for it that she’s insisted on tethering them together as they go to the bathroom.
She managed to release him from the desk and tie herself to him with the ACE bandage, but when they tried to walk, her crutches made a holy mess of things, and he ended up carrying her like a bride over the threshold into the bathroom, his hands bound together beneath her.
Breathless, he sets her down carefully, concerned about her ankle, and she leans heavily on him as he untangles them.
She smells like soap and sweat and something floral. Realizing he is breathing her in, he pinches his nose closed to stop it.
She holds on to his shoulders as she hops over the bandage on her good leg, then lifts her injured ankle for him to duck beneath. He crouches and swoops, but before he’s through, she loses her balance and ends up toppling over on him, his shoulder between her legs and her arms clinging to his head.
“Stop making me laugh,” she squeals, “or I swear I’m going to pee my panties.”
“Don’t you dare,” he says. “This day has been humiliating enough without being peed on by my suspect.”
He manages to set her back on her good foot and come out the other side.
“Technically, I’m your captor, not your suspect,” she says as she leans on him to regain her balance.
“Like I said, totally humiliating.”
Her forearms are on his chest, her breath on his neck. It’s the closest he’s been to a woman in months, and before he can stop himself, he finds himself breathing her in again.
He shifts his focus to his full bladder, hoping to distract the other organ that’s treacherously sprung to life. Until this moment, he was fairly certain the most mortifying experience of his career was being hijacked by a woman on crutches, then being driven away in the trunk of his own rental car, but getting a boner while she helps him take a whiz would definitely top that.
She hops around him in a circle to unwind the final tangle, then says, “Got it. Now, turn around so I can pee . . . and put your hands over your ears.”
He does as she asks, a smile filling his face, and he wants to wipe it away because he knows he shouldn’t be smiling and should instead be assessing the situation and considering his escape.
The problem he’s having is not whether he can escape but rather whether he should. Even with his hands bound, now that he’s untethered from the desk, he could easily overpower her. But each time he considers it, he decides against it. The best chance for resolving this without anyone getting hurt is to convince Torelli to turn herself in. Which means remaining her “captive” for as long as it takes.
And, of course, there’s also the not-so-minor consideration of Herrick returning at any moment. There are two miles of open desert between him and the highway, and if she catches him, she’ll either bring him back and tether him more securely or shoot him, neither option particularly appealing.
“Your turn,” Torelli says as she hops up beside him and leans on the sink.
“Run the water,” he says. “And put your hands over your ears.”
“Wow, you must be a loud pee-er.”
“I’m a guy.”
She giggles like she’s genuinely having fun, then turns on the faucet. He watches as she squeezes her eyes shut and presses her hands against her ears. She looks like a little girl playing hide-and-seek, a little like Shelly, and he swallows as his guilt and concern grow.
35
GRACE
Miles needs his diaper changed.
“Turn wide,” Grace says. “Go out, then come in sharp.” She uses her index finger to draw in the air what she means.
Mattie nods, then haltingly pulls the truck into a spot at the far end of the parking lot of the rest stop.
The truck is not easy to drive. It’s a Chevy Silverado king cab with oversize tires that they bought off a man named Wade who’d been parked beside them at the Starbucks where Grace stopped to get a coffee.
Fortunately, Mattie is a natural and a good listener. She has paid careful attention to everything Grace has said, and Grace is impressed by how quickly she’s caught on.
“You came in too tight,” Grace says. The front tire is on the line. “Back up and do it again.”
Mattie checks her side mirrors, checks the rearview mirror, checks them again, then looks over her shoulder, backs the truck up, straightens it, pulls in again.
She did it perfectly, but Grace doesn’t say so. The only acknowledgment she gives is to climb from the truck. Like her grandmother used to say, “Compliments need to be hard earned, else they don’t mean much at all.”
Skipper and Mattie head to the vending machines as Grace carries Miles to the restroom.
Miles kicks and smiles as she changes him, then laughs when she raspberries his tummy after. He reaches to snag the wipe, and for a minute, she plays with him, dangling the cloth and snatching it away, feeling guilty for how little time she’s spent with him the past couple of days.
Since they started this wild ride, Hadley has done the lion’s share of the mothering—the pampering, the feeding, the coddling—things that seem to come much more naturally to her. The woman is seriously gifted when it comes to babies, or at least when it comes to Miles. She just picks Miles up and he quiets. It infuriates Grace but also makes her incredibly grateful. For two days, Miles has not cried for more than a minute, Hadley mystically able to soothe him each time he starts.
She looks at him lying there, smiling and kicking, and she marvels at how quickly he’s changing. He laughs all the time now and looks more like Jimmy because of it. She smiles at the small dimple on his right cheek that twitches when he’s determined, a trait that makes him look a little like her. It amazes her that five months ago this little guy didn’t exist. How is that possible when her entire world now revolves around him, this erupting bundle of life?
“You and me, kiddo,” she says, stroking the smooth skin of his forehead with the back of her hand. “Somehow we’re going to get t
hrough this.”
He bats her away and tries again to snag the wipe, making her smile. She taunts him by waving it just out of his reach, and his face grows fierce, his little hands flailing.
She chuckles and dips the wipe low enough for him to grab, and his face lights up in triumph as he snags it from her grip.
She knows she should get going but doesn’t want to step from this moment and into the next, reluctant to face the uncertainty of what lies ahead. Finally, with a deep sigh, she gathers him up and walks back outside.
The sun is high in the sky now, the heat sweltering. Skipper and Mattie stand near the vending machines. In front of them is a kid perhaps Mattie’s age and beside him another kid a year or two younger.
The first is tall, thick, and lumpy; the other, short and thin.
“Give it back,” Mattie says.
It’s then that Grace notices that the large boy has Skipper’s hat and is waving it in the air, out of Skipper’s reach. Skipper leaps at him, trying to grab it. The boy easily swings it away as he says, “Retard.”
Grace’s vision goes red.
“I told you, give it back,” Mattie says, stepping toward the kid.
He stares her down, not budging as he continues to wave the hat in the air.
Grace takes a step toward them, then reconsiders. She scans around her, and her eyes catch on the salt flat behind her; then she looks in the trash can beside her as a plan forms in her mind.
Grabbing an empty Jack Daniel’s bottle from the trash along with a half-empty Coke cup, she carries them back the way she came.
A moment later, she is back. Without hesitation, she walks behind the boy and swipes the hat from his hand before he can react. As she passes the younger boy, she says, “Don’t follow your brother,” and her eyes slide to the salt flat beyond the restroom and the bottle of Jack Daniel’s, now half-full with watered-down Coke, glinting a few yards in.
Mattie and Skipper follow her, Mattie’s anger pulsing in waves.
“I’ll drive,” Grace says when they reach the truck.
“I hate jerks like that,” Mattie mumbles through clenched teeth as she climbs into the passenger seat.
Hadley & Grace Page 14