Grounds to Believe

by Shelley Bates

  “I’m trying to fix that. Hey, slow down.”

  She swung around to face him. “I said, leave me alone!”

  He stopped dead, the painted lines of two empty parking spaces between them. Lifting empty hands, he moved them apart, palms up, in a gesture of appeal. His leather jacket opened to reveal a clean white T-shirt under it. “I’m sorry,” he said, his voice soft. His eyes were hollows filled with pain. “I didn’t mean to frighten you. I just wanted to have a cup of coffee and…” He shrugged and let the sentence trail away. “I…I lost my wife last year and I’m a little out of practice at this. Sorry.”

  Julia bit her lip. Her conditioning against talking to outsiders warred with compunction that she had hurt the feelings of another—one who seemed to have been deeply hurt already. The needs of others always came before your own. She had jumped to conclusions about his character because of the way he was dressed, and had let those assumptions guide her behavior—just like a worldly person. Outsiders had done the same to her often enough.

  “I’m sorry,” she apologized in her turn, her voice quieter but still edged with caution. “But I can’t. I’m…I’m expected somewhere.” She’d run over to Madeleine’s and see if Owen was home with news, thereby turning her little fib into the truth.

  The biker looked down at the asphalt, and shoved one hand into the pocket of his jeans. “At least let me introduce myself properly, as one lover of books to another.” He took a step toward her and held out the other hand. Automatically hers came up. “I’m Ross Malcolm. And you’re Julia…?” His big hand, warm and callused, engulfed hers in a firm grip. As she pulled away, his fingers slid along hers as though he didn’t want to let go.

  Her hand tingled and she jerked it back. “McNeill,” she said reluctantly. Her upbringing wouldn’t even allow her the safety of a lie.

  “It’s a pleasure to meet you, Julia McNeill,” he said, a smile flavoring his voice with warmth. The streetlight lit his face from the side, leaving it half silver and half black. Shadows filled the hollow curve between eyebrow and cheekbone. He looked like Satan himself. Satan after God had barred him from paradise. She circled past him, edging toward her car. A truck turned the corner, coming toward them, its headlights sweeping away the dark.

  “Sure I can’t change your mind about that coffee?” he asked with a smile, shrugging one shoulder toward the warmly lit windows.

  For half a second she actually wondered what it might be like. Then her good sense returned. Choose as a date one who’d make a good mate. The aphorism was printed on a fridge magnet in her mother’s kitchen, handmade by Linda Bell ten years ago. She’d seen it so many times it was photographically reproduced on her brain cells, ready for moments like this.

  She longed suddenly for Derrick’s arms. Safe, reliable Derrick, who was both date and mate material. Bikers in leather jackets were not, great smiles notwithstanding. “I’m sorry, I can’t,” she repeated a little desperately. She dashed to her car and locked herself in. As she accelerated out of the parking lot and down the street, she passed his motorcycle. It was parked at the curb, its front wheel facing out.

  Choose as a date one who’d make a good mate.

  “Organized Crime Task Force.”

  The no-nonsense male voice told Miriam the folksy aunt persona wouldn’t work this time. She was about at the end of her tether, chasing the wretched man all over the countryside. It was only by sheer dumb luck that she’d thought to ask the bus driver if he knew what OCTF stood for as they’d roared into Seattle the night before. She’d already found out that he had a daughter in the police department, and at the time it had seemed like a shot in the dark.

  A shot whose aim had surprised her. God surely worked in mysterious ways.

  “Ross Malcolm, please.” There. That was a pretty good imitation of a lawyer in a hurry.

  He put her through without further comment.

  “O-Crime, Harper.”

  End it all. It was never easy. Of course Malcolm wouldn’t pick up the phone. He’d probably moved to Alaska. In which case she and the girl would pack up their things and get out of this homeless shelter on the first available bus back to the meeting point.

  “Ross Malcolm, please,” she repeated.

  “He’s not here. Can I take a message?”

  “But he works there, correct?”

  “Correct. He’s out of town. Can I help you?”

  She sighed. One step forward, two steps back. “No. Can you give me a number where I can reach him?”

  “Who is this?”

  She hesitated. Best to go with the truth, now that she’d finally found someone who seemed to know something.

  “I’m a friend of the family. I’m trying to get in touch with him.”

  There was a pause. “If you give me your number I’ll have him call you,” the man called Harper said with equal parts cordiality and caution.

  “If you would just tell me where he is, I’ve got news for him. About his daughter.”

  “Daughter?”

  The man sounded so flummoxed that Miriam gave up. “Yes, daughter. Condemn that man, I’ve tracked him all over the state and I’m done trying. You tell Ross Malcolm that Annie’s dead, and if he cares about the girl, he’d better get himself back here.”

  She banged the receiver down on yet another pay phone, this one in the hallway of the shelter, and resisted the urge to shriek with frustration. Moses was so right. The government were all about hiding and obfuscation and preventing honest people from doing the right thing.

  It wasn’t until she’d returned to the cots assigned to her and the girl that she realized she’d hung up before telling the Harper man where or who she was.

  Just as well. Let Ross Malcolm try and find her for a change.

  Chapter Five

  “He asked you out?” Claire breathed in fascinated horror. “A real biker?”

  Julia bent at the waist and began to brush her hair. “As real as they get.” The image of Ross Malcolm riding that machine past the bookshop was etched on her mind as permanently as the rhyme on Linda Bell’s fridge magnet. “How many bikers can there be in Hamilton Falls?”

  “Not very many. This is a four-wheel-drive town if ever I saw one. So what did you do?”

  “Do?” Julia straightened and flipped her hair down her back. Claire, standing at the mirror, tucked a few wayward strands into her own neatly braided bun. “I said no, of course. What do you think?”

  “Well, of course you said no,” Claire said, lifting her chin to adjust the bow of her black silk blouse. “What I meant was, did he give you any trouble?”

  “No. Just tried to talk me out of it. Good grief, Claire, there must be a thousand worldly girls in this town. Why couldn’t he pick on one of them instead of bothering me?” She took up a combat position in front of the bathroom mirror and tried to surprise her unruly red curls into a roll like Madeleine’s. She never stopped hoping that a few obedient hair genes might have been distributed to her as well. A modest, godly hair style—or the lack thereof—was the biggest cross she had to bear.

  Claire met Julia’s eyes in the mirror. “Maybe he’s searching. Maybe he sees something in you that he wouldn’t find in a worldly girl.”

  “Oh, my,” Julia murmured weakly. The roll sprang out from under her fingers and unwound itself down her back. He’d said he’d lost his wife. His eyes had confirmed it. Had she really been so self-centered that she’d mistaken a cry for help for interest in herself? She closed her eyes in shame.

  “I’ve had total strangers walk up to me in the street and ask what I stood for,” Claire went on, pretending not to notice. “Don’t you think you should give him a chance?”

  Nobody ever asked her things like that, but when she did get the chance, she’d blown it. “You think I should have gone out with him. What would the Shepherd say?” She gave up on the roll and began the same old boring French braid.

  “Julia, for goodness’ sake, it was only coffee. It wasn’t like h
e asked you to something that would jeopardize your soul, like a movie or a dance.”

  “But still…Elder’s Sister-in-law Spotted in Café with Biker. Try explaining that one to dear Alma Woods. She’d think I was condemned for sure. Not that she doesn’t think that now.”

  “I know. I wore heels last Sunday and you should have heard her. But really, you wouldn’t need to explain a thing if it meant he came to Mission.”

  This conversation was getting completely out of hand. “Speaking of which,” Julia said, snapping a covered elastic around the tail end of the braid with a sound of finality, “we’d better get going. Mission starts in twenty minutes.”

  On Sunday evenings, Melchizedek presided at the hall, spreading the word of God to Stranger and Elect alike. As they walked in, Julia spotted Owen and Madeleine already in the front row.

  “Madeleine is such an example,” Claire whispered to her. “Her service to God always comes first, doesn’t it?” The first Sunday after Ryan had been admitted to hospital, Julia had been prepared to take her sister’s place at the old upright piano for the hymns, thinking that Madeleine would be unable to do it. She’d even gone so far as to sit in the front row, closest to the instrument. But Madeleine, putting her own emotion aside for the sake of service to her Lord, had walked to the front and played as flawlessly as ever, even on “Suffer the Little Children.” And Julia’s gesture of help to her grieving sister had gone unnoticed. Which was just as well, Julia reminded herself. The sacrifices God valued most were performed in secret, anyway.

  She and Claire seated themselves three-quarters of the way back with the young people. Julia barely had time to put her purse under her seat when Derrick sidled into the row from the other side and took the empty seat beside her. As Melchizedek announced the first hymn, she quietly put her hymnbook on the floor next to her purse and allowed Derrick to hold his for her.

  No wonder everyone thought they were going to announce their engagement any day. Couples who were going together might sit side by side in Mission, but only the ones who were “serious” actually shared a hymnbook. If she wasn’t serious about him, she should never have allowed him to do it the first time. If she was, she should stop being so difficult and tell him so.

  Unbidden, the image of Ross Malcolm rose up before her, all silver and shadow and pain. She couldn’t imagine a greater contrast to the man beside her. Derrick, his clean, gentle hands holding the hymnbook, was a true sheep, obedient and innocent. Ross? He was like a wolf, slipping from light into darkness and back again, stalking her for who knew what reason.

  Or maybe she did know the reason. Julia bowed her head, convicted in her heart of her own guilt. She hadn’t opened her heart to the promptings of the Spirit when Ross Malcolm spoke to her. She had ignored his pain and thought only of herself.

  Well, she was listening now. When you heard God’s voice through the medium of His Shepherd, you didn’t question it. You obeyed.

  When the service was over, Melchizedek walked solemnly to the back door to greet everyone as they left. As they filed toward the door, Owen and Madeleine joined them. “Four Strangers tonight,” Madeleine said with a gentle smile. “Melchizedek’s influence is increasing.”

  Julia nodded and squeezed her sister’s hand. Four? She scanned the crowd. You could pick a Stranger out right away. Beside a man who must be her husband, the lady from Jim Bell’s office was wearing slacks, for goodness’ sake, and even a necklace. Several of the Elect women were trying hard not to stare. She glanced at the couple from Alma’s apartment building, now shaking hands with Melchizedek. The man’s hair was too long and his wife’s too short, and their faces had a closed, uncomfortable look that the faces of the Elect lacked. However, the Spirit worked miracles. With God’s help they would see their need to conform to the image of Christ, and begin dressing to fit in.

  Julia struggled against an upswell of guilt and inadequacy. She had never brought anyone to Mission in her life. Madeleine brought lots of them. Even Derrick and Claire had brought friends from school. It was an unspoken measure of your worthiness when you brought people, so what did that say about her?

  Maybe she could disappear gracefully, she thought as she emerged onto the sidewalk outside. Not that anyone would notice, with all the new lambs to—

  The streetlights glinted off chrome and Julia stopped as though she had run into a plate-glass window. The man behind her ran into her back and let out a surprised breath. “Sorry, Julia,” he murmured, stepping around her. She was too dismayed to answer.

  Ross Malcolm was sitting on his motorcycle at the far end of the parking lot. Cold streaks of light gleamed on the straight lines of the machine’s exhaust pipes, curved into infinity on the front wheel and the headlights. No one could possibly miss him.

  Oh, no. Please tell me he’s not waiting for me. Please don’t let him see me.

  The parking lot was brightly lit. Julia wished she could melt back into the safety of the hall, but the stream of departing people edged her farther out into his line of sight. “The biker at the Mission” would be fodder for the gossip lines for days. It would rate a paragraph at least in people’s letters to their friends. Madeleine brought visitors to God. But what did Julia do? Caused a scandal with a biker.

  She dodged between two cars, her head down, clutching her Bible case as she had clutched the paperbacks in the bookstore.

  “Julia,” he called.

  The flock of old ladies spilled out the front door, chattering. Derrick was right behind them, craning his neck, looking for her. Behind him she caught a glimpse of Owen’s red-gold hair. What would they say if they caught her speaking to him? The evening air felt chilled and clammy on her cheeks.

  You’re thinking of yourself again. She stopped, gripping her Bible, as the thought came to her, almost as if a voice had spoken in her head. She was. She was reacting in exactly the same way she had before—with human instinct instead of godly compassion. Well, the still small voice had spoken. Cost what it may, she had to listen.

  Ross rose from his lazy position on the seat of the bike, and crossed the parking lot with the loose-hipped, rocking swagger that boots gave a cowboy. She leaned weakly on the rear fender of her car. He ought to know better than to walk like that. He ought to know that she couldn’t speak to an Outsider at Mission, in front of everybody. No matter what the Spirit told her, she was never going to live this down. Never.

  The old ladies had caught sight of them now. Alma Woods’s eyes were so big that a rim of white showed around her muddy irises. Her mouth opened to give the alarm as she grabbed Rebecca Quinn’s elbow.

  Ross closed the last few steps between them. “Hey. What’s the matter?” His leather jacket creaked.

  “Nothing,” she replied, her mouth dry. Blue jeans never looked like that on Derrick. “Wh—what are you doing here?”

  Alma had the attention of three of the others, now. Even Rebecca looked horrified as she tried to steer the fizzing little group away from Julia and over to their cars. Rebecca’s eyebrows lifted in a stark question: Are you all right? The whole crowd was looking their way now, people gawking over their shoulders as they hesitated beside their cars.

  “I just came over to say hello,” he said, leaning a hand on the roof of her car and cocking one hip as though he were prepared to stand there and discuss it for the rest of the night. “Is there something wrong with that?”

  “No, of course not, it’s just that—”

  “Julia, is there a problem?” Melchizedek called from the doorway.

  Ross braced a hip on the side of her car and crossed his arms. Beyond him, Melchizedek made his way over to her, followed by Derrick and Owen. Expressions of serious concern fought with disbelief. No one had ever made such a scene at Mission. Owen’s gaze searched hers, telegraphing the same message as Rebecca: Are you all right?

  “No,” she answered Melchizedek reluctantly. To the outside observer, Ross Malcolm hadn’t done anything wrong—just walked across a public parking lot
to speak to her. To an insider, it was the most scandalous thing to happen in Hamilton Falls since Rita Ulstad had deserted her husband for the man renting their downstairs bedroom seven years before. How on earth was she to think about his pain and his soul when he could cause so much agitation with so little effort?

  Melchizedek lifted his chin and regarded Ross Malcolm, caution mingling with his sense of duty. He extended a hand. “Melchizedek,” he said, infusing the name with the authority of the law and the prophets.

  Owen moved forward to ally himself with the Shepherd, and shook Ross’s hand as well. The contrast between their conservatively cut suits and Ross’s denim and leather was so extreme that Julia felt the hysterical urge to giggle. She bit her lip and let Melchizedek take control of the situation.

  “Are you a…friend of Julia’s?” Melchizedek asked. His voice was calm, but his eyes conveyed his doubt.

  Ross leaned on Julia’s car, his big body separating Julia from her protectors, his casual stance somehow conveying possessiveness. “We’ve met.”

  Melchizedek and Owen glanced at each other, and Julia could practically see the uncertainty telegraphed between them. Where did they meet? How does he know her? What does he want?

  Mark McNeill joined them, lifting an inquiring eyebrow at Owen, who shook his head. Behind her father, Julia could see Elizabeth surrounded by her best friends, watching them with sympathetic horror. She could just imagine what her mother was thinking.

  “You came too late,” Melchizedek went on. “If you’d come a little earlier, you could have joined us inside.”

  “I was here,” Ross replied easily. “But I made a bad guess on the time. I heard you singing and figured the service was over.”

  Melchizedek seized on his last words. “Next time, don’t wait out in the parking lot. Come in. We start at seven.”

  “Thanks for the invitation,” Ross said. “I’ll take you up on it.” He glanced over his shoulder. “Good night, Julia,” he said in a soft voice, as if they were intimate in some way, and sauntered off across the parking lot.