Page 31 of Betsy
But I had to be careful. Not so much for my sake but for hers. She didn’t trust. Me. Those in the music industry. People in general, probably. And that was something I’d have to earn. Prove to her that not everyone was like the person who had caused her so much pain in the past. ThatIwasn’t like that. I could be patient when I needed to be.
I smiled again but turned my head and hid my grin in the crook of my shoulder lest Betsy see and get suspicious.
She’d find out just how persistently patient I could be.
I bent and picked up one of the amplifiers. They’d go in the back storage compartment under the bus in a neat row, bungie corded if necessary so they wouldn’t shift too much on the road and get damaged. They weren’t exactly light, but propelling my body up the faces of vertical cliffs had honed my muscles, so hefting these around wasn’t too much of a workout.
An unintelligible sound emitted from Betsy’s vicinity. Was that a squeak or a huff or a snort? None of those really described the surprising sound. I looked over my shoulder at her in time to catch the wave of her hair. As if she’d quickly whipped her head around in order to not be caught staring at me.
A satisfying warmth spread out from behind my breastbone almost to the point that I couldn’t even feel the weight in my arms any longer. Was Betsy…attracted to me? Even if it was against her will?
I wanted to laugh but instead bit down on my tongue to keep myself in check. A chuckle then, at that precise moment, would do nothing to coax Betsy to my side. More like give her one more justification to not like “guys like me,” as she put it. Because she’d know she’d been caught checking me out and think I was over here preening my ego. (Okay, maybe I was a little. But a beautiful woman who I found myself more attracted to every day was actually showing an ounce of interest. I don’t think anyone could blame me for a teeny tiny mental fist-bump.)
She busied herself with coiling cords, and I passed by without a word. Dave was hunched inside the middle storage compartment of the bus, his arm popping out to take hold of a tom drum from Jimmy, when I made it to the parking lot. A few hours later, with everything packed and loaded and a sheen of sweat coating most of our brows, we were ready to go.
“Let’s have a word of prayer before we head out.” I extended my hands away from my sides, and the rest of the band shuffled forward to form a circle. Everyone except Betsy, who eyed us with as much skepticism as if I’d said let’s form a circle and have a séance.
I let go of Marcus’s hand and extended my fingers to Betsy. “I promise we won’t sing ‘Kumbaya.’ I know how much you love that song.”
She huffed but stepped forward. She eyed my inviting palm with wariness but then squared her shoulders and marched to my side, gripping my hand with the force of a businesswoman wanting to intimidate her competition in the boardroom.
I swallowed back my chuckle, then ever so lightly ran my thumb across the ridges of her knuckles. She sucked in a breath, and her fingers loosened like someone letting air out of a bicycle tire. I readjusted our hands to fit comfortably together. Snuggly.
When I looked up, she scowled at me. I smiled innocently in return, then closed my eyes.
“Father God, we thank You for this opportunity to use our voices and instruments to exalt Your name, and we pray that our efforts on this journey will bring glory to the kingdom and not to this world. Keep us safe on the roads, and go before us so the greatest good can be accomplished. Amen.”
Hushed amens echoed mine. Betsy stared at me with her brow furrowed. She blinked, cleared her expression, then stormed past me.
My lips tipped in her wake.
Dave climbed into the driver’s seat while Jimmy took shotgun. I waited for the other three to climb the stairs into the main body of the bus, then followed behind them. She wasn’t the sleekest or most classy wheels on the road, but I’d gotten a good deal on the rental, and the owner assured me she was reliable. While the outside looked like something you’d see in a Dystopian blockbuster, the inside had been renovated in the last decade. Most importantly, it had six beds.
“This is not as awful as I’d imagined.” Tricia’s gaze swung around the space. She ran a hand along the tiny kitchen—mostly a miniature square sink, dollhouse-sized refrigerator, and a one-foot-by-one-foot block of counter space—before lowering herself onto the cushion of the banquette.
“Can I claim any of these beds?” Marcus called from farther back in the bus. There were three bunk beds two high—one on one side and two on the other.
“Leave one of the bottom bunks for me, please. That way I can just literally roll myself out of bed in the morning.” Tricia grimaced from where she sat. “That might be the only way I’ll heft my body out of there and not imitate a pathetic turtle that’s flipped upside down on its shell and can’t get itself up and walking again.”
“Trish, if you—”
She held up a hand to stop me.
I sighed. “Okay, but please let me know if you change your mind. At any time. You know I’ll buy you a plane ticket home. Just say the word.”
Dave turned the key in the ignition, and the floor started vibrating beneath our feet. “Let’s get this show on the road.” He pulled out of the church’s parking lot and turned onto the street.
Betsy swayed with the motion, and I almost reached out to steady her in case she lost her balance and stumbled to the side, but then thought better of it. Maybe because I recognized the flimsy excuse for what it was: a thin justification to be close to her. To touch her. But if I jumped the gun and didn’t bide my time to prove all the things I wanted to prove, then I’d never be able to be close or touch her on a deeper level. And although my body lit up with the idea of a physical connection—two live wires sparking on contact—my soul recognized and craved the rarity of a possibility of the greatest gift of a lifetime.
I just had to get her to trust me.
I slid into the banquette beside Trish. “How about a road trip game?”
“What are you thinking?” Jimmy turned in his seat to look back at us.
“How about Would You Rather?” I peeked over at Betsy out of the corner of my eye. She didn’t really seem like a gaming type of person, but I hoped she’d play along. We had a long drive ahead of us.
Tricia pulled out the elastic band holding her hair back, then scratched her head in the spot her ponytail had been. “I’m in.”
