Chapter 3
THREE
How she’d gotten roped into babysitting, Selah didn’t know.
Okay, maybe she could figure it out. Sarah simply hadn’t had anyone else to watch the kids when the chopper from Seattle arrived to airlift Grant to the hospital, extra room for only one.
Selah’s mouth had opened without her brain clicking in to stop her. “I’ll watch them until their grandparents get here.”
Except the grandparents were trapped at their farm northeast of Leavenworth, the train still blocking the road to through traffic, at least according to the short call Sarah had with them before boarding the chopper.
With her cell phone out of commission, Selah had relied on the front-desk phone at the Cashmere Motor Inn. She’d used it to call her parents and let them know she was safe—and would they please call Chloe too?
And now, as night sank around them, they were safe, albeit still traumatized.
Tommy wore a cast, thanks to an orthopedic doctor who worked in Leavenworth but just happened to live outside Cashmere.
The clinic had a small X-ray machine, and the doctor had set the wrist and put a cast on it, with a follow-up scheduled.
Selah stood at the open door to her motel room, James leaning against the second-story railing that overlooked the courtyard.
Overhead, stars were flung across a semicloudy sky, the mountains rising around them to close them in, the smells of pine and fir mixing with the aroma of the pizza that lay on a small round table.
Tommy and Amy sat in one of the double beds, bundled up under the comforter, watching an episode of Happy Days, the most G-rated show Selah could find in the cable lineup.
The Fonz was saying something about everything being all right.
Tell that to Amy, who was externally mostly unhurt but clearly needing the teddy bear that James had purchased for her from some local pharmacy. Cute little girl clung to the bear as she curled up on the big bed, her blonde hair in snarls and tufts.
“Tomorrow, I’ll find us a couple cell phones,” James said. “Hopefully you stored your contacts in the cloud. And if you put your SIM card into the new phone, it should store your number. People can get ahold of you.”
He had bought her an oversized blue sweatshirt that had a logo of the Cascade Mountains on the front. And, he’d grabbed a shower and changed out of his bloody clothes into a black pullover with a similar logo on the breast.
She desperately needed a shower too.
“Thank you, James.” She drew in a breath. “If it hadn’t been for you, I’d still be back at the train. Maybe trapped in the dining-car hallway. Or…” She swallowed, the explosion still vivid in her memory.
“We’re fine. And tomorrow we’ll get those kids to their grandparents and you to your camp and…” He gave her a tight smile. “And me back to work.”
Right. Mergers and acquisitions. Which might be boring but was definitely safe and normal and didn’t include tactical gear and guns.
There she went, thinking of North again.
“I need to get a shower and some shut-eye,” she said. “You going to be okay?”
He nodded, cocked his head. “Turns out that sitting down at your table might have been the best thing I did all day.”
Oh. Um…Was he flirting with her? “Me…me too.”
He smiled warmly and made no other moves toward flirting as he bid her good night. “I’ll be right next door if you need me.”
Again, he exuded the confidence of someone who knew how to handle himself.
Someone like North.
Who wasn’t coming after her.
Oy vey. Perhaps Washington wasn’t far enough away to forget him.
“Thanks.” She headed inside the room, locked the door, and picked up her pack. Probably would have been smart to search for her duffel bag, but her pack contained emergency toiletries and underclothes—the practice born of missing flights or spending too many layovers in airports.
She turned to the kids. “Stay here. Please don’t go anywhere.”
Tommy put an arm around his sister. Nodded.
Good kid. Still scared but trying to brave it out. Weren’t they all?
She fired up the shower, found her clean underclothes, a T-shirt, and socks, set them out, and then stepped under the heat.
She gladly let the day’s trauma wash down the drain. From the phone call with Chloe to the panic over Grant, and even over funny David, whom they’d shipped off to another hospital. Hopefully he would make it home. To mow.
She washed her hair free of the smoke and grime and blood and let her thoughts drift back to that crazy day when she’d met North.
Sunny day. Barbecue at her parents’ home. She’d been back from Africa, where she’d taught ESL in a girls’ school, worked in a refugee camp, and had big dreams about changing lives.
North had sauntered up to her, wearing a pair of cargo shorts, flip-flops, and a Life is Good T-shirt, flashing those chocolaty-brown eyes at her, and offering to help her hang a volleyball net. Right then, her brains—and aspirations—had sort of fallen out of her head.
Especially after they’d tested out the rig with a few volleys. He’d asked her about her job and her life and had actually listened to her rabbit trail into forever about the people she’d met and how she just wanted to make a difference, to offer peace to war-torn lands.
Deep inside, maybe she’d suspected he was part of the war makers, but as the night settled around them, they’d wandered down the beach. Fireworks had lit the sky, and that’s when he’d told her that he loved Jesus.
She gave her heart to the man, right there.
It had helped that he held her hand, his firm and strong around hers. Told her about being a pastor’s kid, how he’d grown up wanting to do something important too.
He hadn’t even had to tug her, hadn’t even had to ask before she stepped up to him, her hands on his chest, and kissed him softly. Sweetly.
He had simply kissed her back, not even leaning in, not taking more than she offered. She’d never felt so safe.
And then…well, then came the rest. And Mr. Safe turned out to be…
A scream lifted in the next room, and Selah shut off the water, grabbed a towel. She opened the door, stuck her head out. “What? Are you okay?”
Amy was crying, Tommy’s arms around her. He looked up. “The news came on. It has pictures of the train.”
Oh. Shoot. She closed the door and yanked on her clothing. Her hair dripping, she came out, saw Tommy’s eyes still glued to the screen.
Hers were too as she saw the chopper’s view of the destruction. Most of the train was charred, emergency lights washing over the wreckage.
A few survivors spoke of the event—the screech of brakes, the violence of the accident. “And then the entire train just exploded.” A woman, mid-fifties, grimy, her white hair blackened. “We barely got out—and we were way down in the dining car.”
Huh. Selah didn’t remember seeing her, but she’d been focused on a croissant that now felt a million light-years away.
The segment returned to the reporter, who updated the anchor on the number of casualties—thirteen, mostly at the front of the train—and how authorities were looking into why a dump truck had been parked in the center of the tracks. And of course, the hunt for the driver.
“What about the fire, Shelby?” This from the anchor.
“Authorities aren’t saying what the cause might be, but bystanders also report the sound of gunshots, so there is more to the story.”
Yes, Selah definitely remembered the shooting part of the accident.
“One of the locals who showed up to help reports having his truck stolen also, so officials are looking into that as a possible connection.”
And then, even as her brain sorted that out, a picture of a light-blue 1978 F-150 appeared on the screen.
Oh. My.
She glanced at Tommy, but he had his eyes closed, cuddled up with his sister.
She got up, turned off the television. Then she adjusted the pillows behind them and eased them down, pulling up the covers.
Said a little prayer for Grant and Sarah.
And then she climbed into bed and forced herself not to believe that Mr. Nice Guy next door had lied to her.
* * *
Please, Selah, be here…
The emergency-room doors of Cascade Medical in Leavenworth slid open with a hiss, and the wall of noise hit North like a physical blow.
Phones rang at the information desk in the lobby jammed with people.
Not a big place—it seemed about the size of a large northern lodge, with timber framing and an alpine feel.
Not the kind of place to handle a train wreck, despite the relatively few cars on the Empire Builder.
According to the report on the radio as North had driven through the mountains from Seattle, the entire train consisted of ten cars, plus a freight car, two locomotives, and a caboose.
Two hundred plus passengers, including the crew.
And it seemed all two hundred had landed in this tiny nine-bed hospital.
People sat on the floor, some of them holding gauze to their heads, others simply curled up with backpacks or hospital blankets. A baby cried, the mother walking the corridor past the information desk to calm it.
Gurneys were pushed against the walls, a few people hooked up to IVs, and nurses shoved in and out of a large door that led to the ER area.
Despite the antiseptic setting, the odor of smoke and tragedy permeated everything. It mingled with the coppery tang of blood, with fear and sweat and something burning that might have been dinner in the cafeteria long, long ago.
North’s tactical watch read 12:17 a.m. His entire body ached, his eyes gritty. The little Sonic had done its best, but he’d crawled up the massive climbs into the mountains, and frankly, he might have been able to run here faster.
He headed to the front desk, stopping behind a younger man with a hand pressed to his gut. Seemed he’d already received medical help, because he wore a bandage on his forehead, taped up as if there might be stitches underneath.
North glanced around the room, his gaze falling on each person.