Grounded (42 page)

She believes in me …

Grace blinked back sudden tears, drained her coffee, and stood up. “Well, I should probably get my shower. Thanks, Mr. Bentley.”

He got up in a hurry, slid the door open a crack—probably to see if the coast was clear—and then let her slip out.

But darn it! Someone else was in the shower.

Breakfast in the dining car that morning was fun. Grace and Sam were seated with two young Amish women on their way home from Mexico, where they'd been teaching school to a group of Mennonite children who'd lost their teacher a few months ago. A new teacher had been found, so they were returning to their community in Indiana. Grace was fascinated—what a different world they lived in. But the two young women—Rachel and Elizabeth—seemed just as fascinated by Grace and Sam, asking lots of questions about what it was like to tour the country singing popular Christian songs.

As the dining steward cleared their dishes, Grace told Sam she'd like to go to the lounge car, see if she could find Ramona again and talk to her. “Okay,” Sam said. “Think I'll go back to our compartment. The beds should be made up by now.” She grinned. “My book is getting to the good part.”

Sam had been spending hours with her nose in a well-worn paperback. Something by Toni Morrison. Grace hadn't realized Sam was such a reader. Maybe she'd ask to read it when Sam was done.

Grace walked the length of the lounge car, but didn't see the girl. Should she walk through the coaches? That might seem awfully obvious. On a whim, Grace decided to check the café below the lounge—and there she was, sitting at one of the booths chowing down on a hamburger. The lower area seemed unusually warm and the girl had taken off the suede jacket and laid it on the table along with her shoulder bag.

“Hi again!” Grace smiled, indicating the opposite padded bench of the booth. “May I sit—or are you expecting your friend?”

Ramona stopped mid-chew and stared at Grace, then her dark eyes flickered anxiously toward the stairs and back again. But she shook her head. Grace decided that meant she wasn't expecting him
and slid into the booth with a smile. “That's an unusual breakfast.” It was only nine thirty.

Ramona put down the hamburger and wiped catsup and mustard off her mouth with a napkin as she swallowed. “Max was still asleep,” she said defensively, “but I got hungry.” She eyed Grace. “Did you come down here to get something to eat too?”

“Oh.” Grace thought fast. “No, just wanted to get a cup of coffee.” She stood up. “Please, go ahead and eat. I'll be back in a minute.”

She ordered a decaf coffee from the café counter—she'd already had enough caffeine for one morning—and came back to the booth. “So you're on your way to Chicago. How long will you be staying?”

Again the girl's eyes darted toward the stairs. “Uh, not sure. Max wants to see some friends. Stuff like that.”

At the station in Los Angeles, Ramona had been outgoing and friendly. Overly so. Now she seemed like a timid rabbit. But Grace had an idea why.

Grace took off the plastic lid from her disposable hot cup and peeled the top off a couple tiny creamers even though she usually drank her coffee black. She decided to press. “You said it's your first visit to Chicago. How about Max? His too?”

The girl shook her head. “No. He's … from there.” She took another bite of her hamburger—just as the train gave a lurch rounding a corner around a large sandstone formation. But before Grace could grab her coffee cup, it tipped, and hot liquid sloshed all over the suede jacket.

“Oh, no!” she cried, grabbing the empty cup, even as the plastic bottles of catsup and mustard also fell over and rolled across the table toward the window. With her free hand, Grace grabbed the mustard, but the cap was loose and mustard squirted every which way.

In horror, Grace stared at the jacket, a large coffee stain darkening the beautiful tan suede. And as if that wasn't bad enough, splashes of yellow mustard had landed on the jacket too.

“My jacket!” screeched Ramona. She looked absolutely stricken. “Max will kill me! He bought that for me for the trip!”

“Oh, Ramona.” Grace picked up the jacket, but knew better than to start dabbing at the stains with a napkin. “I am
so
sorry. Look—I'll have it cleaned and get it back to you.”

Ramona glared at her. “What do you mean?”

“This is my fault. I should pay to get it cleaned. If you give me the address of the place you're staying, I'll get it cleaned and bring it to you myself. I promise.”

But the girl shook her head. “No, no, you can't … I don't … I'm not sure where we'll be staying. Don't know the address.”

“Do you have a cell phone? I'll call you.”

Again Ramona shook her head, her eyes brimming with tears.

“Oh, Ramona. Please don't cry. I'm sure I can make this right. Here.” Grace dug in her purse for the small notebook she carried and a pen. “Here's my cell phone number. As soon as you get to Chicago and find out where you're staying, you call me and let me know. I'll bring your jacket as soon as it's cleaned.”

Grace stood up, jacket in hand, then reached out and touched the girl on the shoulder. “Again, I am so sorry. Please forgive me.”

Ramona grabbed her hand. “Just don't … just don't tell Max about this. I'll think of something, I'll say I put it away. He'd kill me if he knew I didn't have it.”

Grace nodded. “All right. But don't worry. I'm sure a dry cleaner can get these stains out if we do it as soon as possible. I'll get it back to you good as new or … or I'll buy you a new one.” She gave the girl a reassuring smile. “Just hang on to my number, okay?”

Sam gaped wide-eyed as Grace spilled the whole story. She held up the jacket. “You're right. It's one awful mess. I'll go find something to wrap it in so that mustard doesn't get over any of
our
clothes.” She slipped out the door to go look for the attendant.

Grace leaned back against the headrest of her seat with a sigh. Hopefully the jacket would come clean. But it bothered her that the girl had said,
“Max will kill me!”
two different times. Of course people
often said that when they knew someone would be upset, but she'd seemed really afraid. Made her even more suspicious that the guy—

Grace's cell phone rang. Fishing it out of her bag, she smiled at the caller ID.
Bongo Booking Agency
. “Hello, Jeff. Checking up on me again?”

“You bet.” Her agent's voice sounded warm, almost excited. “I've been getting some great reports from the tour … but first of all, are you okay? Barry said he was afraid you'd really hurt your voice again by the end of the tour.”

“I think I'm going to be all right. But glad it's over.”

“I hear your meet and greet times practically turned into counseling sessions … that's just amazing, Grace.”

She chuckled at his choice of words. “It was pretty overwhelming at times, I have to admit. But to be honest, Jeff, I've never had a tour like this one, never felt the Spirit of God so present. There are a lot of hurting young people out there and … and somehow they just opened up.”

“Look, I want to hear all about it. I mean that. In fact, I'm actually calling because I have this really crazy idea. Are you sitting down?”

Grace listened as Jeff spilled his idea, her eyes widening. She swallowed. It
was
crazy. Absolutely crazy! “But … do you think it's even possible?”

“Yes. I've checked with Amtrak. But you'll have to get off at Albuquerque and talk to the ticket office there to get your tickets changed.”

Sam came in with a large, empty trash bag, saying, “Look what I found.” But Grace put up her hand for silence as she listened to Jeff's instructions.

“Okay,” she said finally. “I'll see what we can do and let you know.” She closed her phone and eyed Sam cautiously. “Um, you're never going to believe this, but that was Jeff Newman. He's, uh, proposing that we get off at Raton, New Mexico, later this afternoon and take an Amtrak Bus to Denver to spend a day at Bongo Booking. He … he thought it'd be a good chance to meet the staff there and give us a chance to debrief about the tour in person.”

“But—”

“Jeff says we could pick up the California Zephyr in Denver tomorrow night, which would get us home the next day. Only one day later. But we'd have to get our tickets changed in Albuquerque—there's a short layover there. What do you think?”

Sam looked flustered. “Are you serious? I mean, I was really looking forward to getting home tomorrow. You should too, don't you think? I'm tired, you're tired. And you need to take care of your voice, give it a good rest.”

Grace studied the young woman who'd been her assistant for over a year now. Good ol' Sam … loyal, smart, funny, practical, helpful in a zillion ways. And so pretty with those sassy twists she wore, creamy caramel skin, and delightful grin. But the Samantha Curtis who'd rescued her at Saturday's concert had something else—a lovely voice. A voice that deserved a chance to be heard. And Jeff's whole nutty idea suddenly made sense in another way.

“I know it sounds crazy,” she admitted. “But I was just thinking. If we take this chance to visit Bongo Booking, maybe we could ask Jeff to set up an appointment for you to talk to someone there about your own career. Would you like to do that?”

Sam's hand flew to her mouth, her large, dark eyes bugging. “You're kidding! Oh, Grace … oh, Grace! Really?
Really?
” She started hopping around their little compartment saying, “Thank you, Jesus! Oh, hallelujah!”

Grace smiled. Well, why not? On top of everything else, it
would
be a good chance for Sam to meet the people at Bongo Booking in person. But it wasn't just the opportunity to meet the Bongo staff that had intrigued Grace. It was something else Jeff had said—something she hadn't shared with Sam. “To be honest, Grace, I got this crazy idea because … because I really want to see you. No, I
need
to see you.”

“This
is
crazy you know,” Sam giggled, standing in the lower vestibule of the sleeper with their suitcases and bags as the Southwest Chief pulled into the station at Raton, New Mexico.

“I know.” Grace smiled absently at another passenger who was determined to get off at this stop for a quick smoke, in spite of announcements over the intercom that Raton was
not
a smoking stop, and would only be in the station long enough for passengers to board or—in their case—make a connection with the Amtrak Thruway Bus to Colorado Springs and Denver. She stepped back deliberately, allowing the nervous man to get between her and Sam and the car attendant, who was waiting till the train totally stopped before opening the door.

This was her chance to slip the note she'd written under Harry Bentley's compartment door just beyond the shower and toilets.

Ever since they got their tickets changed in Albuquerque, Grace had been hoping to get a chance to let her neighbor-in-disguise know about their change in plans. She'd come down to the lower level a couple of times, hoping to catch him alone—but each time there had been someone using one of the toilets or a couple of passengers sitting in the lower-level roomettes with their doors open talking to each other across the passageway.

So she'd written a brief note telling him about their change of plans, along with her cell phone number, asking him to call her if he got a chance and she'd explain more. Then she'd added a PS:
If you can, please keep an eye on a young couple in the first coach behind the lounge car. He's tall, blond hair, late twenties, name is Max. Ramona's
just a teenager, has dark hair. Speaks Spanish. Something doesn't feel right. She seems scared. He seems too controlling
.

She didn't have much to go on. Harry might think she was sticking her nose into other people's business where it didn't belong. But she felt led to say something.