Hadley & Grace(31)

The lack of conversation is deafening. They are in a small confined space; the least Grace could do is make polite conversation to help pass the time. But anytime Hadley starts something, Grace answers with a monosyllabic response and a glare that makes it clear she has no interest in chatting.

She’s probably upset she’s involved in this, and Hadley does feel bad, but what was she supposed to do? The FBI was chasing her. How was she supposed to know they would follow them to Barstow? She figured that once they were out of Orange County, they would be fine.

She glances back at Mattie and Skipper. Skipper stares out the window. Mattie has her eyes closed but opens them when she feels Hadley looking at her. Hadley gives her a reassuring smile, and Mattie offers a thin one back.

Then she shocks her. “That was cool the way you talked that lady into giving us her car. I didn’t think it would work.”

“You didn’t?” Hadley says as a strange ballooning fills her chest, and it takes a second for her to recognize the feeling. It’s been a long time since she’s had anything to be proud of.

Grace chimes in, “How’d you know to wait for someone old?”

Hadley’s pride grows. Grace doesn’t seem easily impressed. “I don’t know. I’ve always liked old people. They’re less uptight about things, so I figured my chances were better.”

Grace nods her approval, and a small smile curls her lips. “I think you’re right. My grandmother would have loved to have been given ten grand to loan her car to someone. She’d have talked about it for years.”

“Were you close with your grandmother?” Hadley asks.

“We’ll stop in Baker,” Grace says curtly, the smile dropping from her face to settle into a tight line. “Less chance of us being spotted there than in Las Vegas.”

Hadley tries not to be hurt by the abruptness.

“Make sure you call Dad,” Mattie says.

Hadley glances back at her.

“He’ll get suspicious if you don’t call him.”

Hadley nods and turns back in her seat, disturbed that Mattie has been thinking about Frank. Mattie is right to worry, but Frank is her dad, and Hadley can’t help but wonder about the damage it might be doing for her to be conspiring against him.

“Do I need to pull over?” Grace says.

“No. I called him this morning from the hotel, and I’ll call him when we stop for dinner. He knows I turn my phone off when I’m driving.”

“What will you tell him about your phone?”

“I’ll tell him I dropped it in the toilet. I’ve done it before.”

“You can use my burner,” Grace says, “so he can’t trace the area code.”

“Your burner?”

“I bought one when we stopped at Walmart.”

“Oh,” Hadley says as her heart sinks, realizing she should have thought of that, and also realizing that, had Grace not said something, she would have made the catastrophic mistake of calling Frank without thinking about the area code.

“Thank you,” she says, meaning it to only be for the offer of the phone, but it comes out thicker than that.

Grace gives a curt nod, but Hadley watches as her jaw twitches, then sees her slide it out to still it.

“So, where are you from originally?” Hadley says. “Do I detect the hint of a southern drawl?”

Grace sighs through her nose. “Look, Mrs. Torelli, we’re in this together because I said I would help you, and I am, but we’re not friends. This doesn’t make us friends.”

Hadley tries not to be stung, but it’s hard. She’s always hated when people don’t like her, and she likes Grace. Last night, when they were counting the money, she actually thought they kind of were friends, or at least friendly.

She turns toward the window and looks out at the same beige scenery they’ve been driving through for hours—beige desert, beige scrub, beige hills in the distance.

“Can you stop that?”

Hadley looks at Grace, then down at her leg, which is jiggling up and down in rhythm with her hand, tapping impatiently on her thigh.

She forces her leg to be still and slides her hand beneath her thigh to stop its twitch, and she decides it’s a good thing she and Grace are not friends because, if they were friends, Hadley would have something very unfriendly to say at the moment.

She turns back to the window with a huff, then quickly straightens. She can’t really blame Grace for being pissed, especially after what happened in Barstow. The cops arrived minutes after they’d left Nancy’s car at the McDonald’s. They could see the police cars from across the street, dozens of them with their lights swirling. She thought Grace might have ditched them right there, but she didn’t. Instead, she growled, “Get in,” and they all scrambled into the van Grace had bought from Craigslist when they were still in Orange County.

At the time, when Grace insisted that they stop at the Walmart so she could buy a car online, Hadley thought she was being ridiculous. Hadley suggested they go to a car lot when they got to Barstow so they could pick the car they wanted.

It turns out Grace was being cautiously brilliant. She wired the money to the seller from the store and instructed him to leave the van at the Motel 6 across from the McDonald’s, with the key hidden behind the bumper. It was like she suspected that what happened in Barstow might happen, and again, Hadley can’t help but wonder how it is she’s so good at this.