Page 178 of We Redeemed the Rain

Downtown Denver was packed. Peter, Sarah, and I weaved in and out of the crowds, passing outdoor restaurant tables, shops, and a thousand things a tourist would want to stop and check out. We were on a mission though. My flight, go figure, got delayed and we were already fifteen minutes late.

We stopped at a crosswalk. Sarah, a pretty redhead, tapped Peter’s arm with the back of her hand. “Are you sure you know where this place is?”

“Yes.”

“It’s not the place she typically sings.”

“I know that.”

“You should pull up the navigation on your phone so we don’t pass it on accident.”

“Come on, you don’t trust me?”

“With directions?” She asked like he was making a joke. “Yeah, that’s an easy no.” She looked to me, her green eyes alight with humor. “Tag, tell him to look it up.”

I just softly chuckled and shook my head.

“Fine, jeez. I’ll look it up.” Peter pulled out his phone and stared at it for a long moment with no reaction in his face whatsoever.

“Hello? Where do we need to go?” Sarah spread her arms wide.

Peter clicked his tongue and averted his face. “Yeah…sorry guys. We gotta turn around.” He spun on the heel of his tennis shoe and started walking the other direction before we could even register what he’d said.

Sarah’s head tipped back with a peal of laughter. When she caught up, she spanked him on the butt. “I told you, you big idiot.”

Peter laughed, too, as his arm settled around her waist. He glanced over his shoulder at me. “Sorry, Tag, it says we got two minutes.”

Tension skittered across my nerve endings. Two minutes. I’d been anxious about all this. Honestly, the flight was torture. I kept wondering if the Thompsons would like me, and if Bea would be happy to see me. Was surprising her really a good idea? Maybe Peter should’ve given her a heads up. The entire family knew I was coming and kept it a secret from her. Bea hadn’t told me the Thompsons were into surprises, but according to Peter, surprises were a family-wide obsession.

Meeting Peter and Sarah did make me feel a touch better. They were both kind, happy, and easy to make conversation with. Peter was talkative and opinionated, but had a lot of grace for other people—like Bea.

Finally, Peter led us to a glass door down an outdoor corridor. Across the front, it read “Feucher Professional Studio.” A soft bell tinkled when we walked in. The interior was dark, quiet. I listened for Bea singing, but heard nothing.

A woman behind a tidy desk looked up. She smiled. “You guys here for Bea?”

“How’d you know?” Peter smiled.

“They told me they were waiting on a few people. Bea is in studio F. So, just go straight down this hall…” She directed us, but might as well have been speaking Latin with the way my brain latched to the words. Everything felt like a blur. My mouth was dry, my chest tight.

I had yearned a moment with this family for fourteen years.

Fourteen years of wanting whatever it was Strings had.

What if it wasn’t what I thought? What if they were angry at me for what happened between the two of us? What if they just didn’t like me? I was a lot better one-on-one than with a group of people. I couldn’t remember the last time I waswithagroupof people. Unless the guys back at the ranch counted.

Numb with tension, I followed Peter and Sarah down the hallway.

When Peter opened the door to the viewing area, the first thing to register in my awareness was the lack of singing. I heard no music. Soft conversation filled the silence instead.

Beyond the door was a cozy, gently lit room with a smattering of people scattered across a couple couches. A coffee table in the middle of the room held drinks and some snacks like peanuts and granola bars.

On the far wall, a picture window gave us a view to a brightly lit studio. A microphone with a shield hung from the ceiling, a stool on the floor in front of it. I recognized Glory on a guitar stand, but Bea wasn’t in the viewing room or the studio.

Every head turned to me.

A chorus of greetings rang out and a few of them stood.

A young guy popped off his spot on the arm of the couch nearest us. “About time. Did Peter get you guys lost?”

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