Why did you think you could fool these guys? Why did you believe you could come here and set them straight about shooting Leah’s cows? Alice thought desperately. She sat down in the chair next to Phil’s, feeling doomed. They’ll only get nastier after they drink more beer . . . God, can You please, please help us get home?
When Adeline approached the table with Dexter’s hard arm around her, she wore a frightened expression. She met Alice’s gaze with the slightest shake of her head, as though to say she hadn’t had a chance to talk to anyone at home, let alone leave a message.
Phil filled the four mugs with beer, his smug expression confirming the stupidity of Adeline’s attempt to get help. “Bottoms up, girls,” he said, leering at the innuendo in his words.
Alice flushed furiously. She nearly choked on her first gulp of beer, wondering why she’d ever pretended she liked it—and wishing she’d never pretended to be someone she wasn’t. Adeline took a short sip, too, trying to make the glass of beer last long enough to plan a way out of this horrible predicament.
Rick came to the table with four jiggers of whiskey. He was grinning as though he already knew that Phil and Dexter were about to win the prizes they’d been trying for ever since the day Alice and Adeline had first hopped into the truck....
“Why don’t you give us some more lessons on shooting pool?” Adeline gazed hopefully at Dexter as he tossed back his shot of whiskey.
Alice grasped for her twin’s conversational straw. “Jah, as I recall, you fellows really enjoy leaning us over the table, showing us how to hold our cue sticks—”
“Why do you keep changing the subject?” Phil demanded after he, too, drained his shot of whiskey in a single gulp. “I want to talk about how you girls’re going to—”
“I’m game.” Dexter’s smile was lopsided as he rose unsteadily to his feet. “If we do what the girls want now, they’ll repay the favor when we take them down the road. Come on, Addie-baby. Let’s show ’em how the game’s played.” He grabbed the shot glass in front of Adeline and gulped the whiskey in it.
Alice hurried to the nearest empty pool table. She stalled, fumbling while racking up the balls, acting clumsy as Adeline came up to help her.
“We’re in a bad spot, Alice,” her sister whispered before lifting the wooden triangle from the green tabletop.
“Keep them talking and drinking,” Alice murmured. “If you can hold their attention, I’ll try to slip away—”
“Too much table talk!” Phil interrupted as he grabbed Adeline’s hand. “Get your little backside down there and I’ll show you how to ram the cue stick so all the balls fly into pockets on your first shot.”
Alice didn’t mention that he’d chosen the wrong twin, because the bleary expression on Dexter’s face told her that he, too, was confused about their identity. She and Adeline had traded places once without telling the guys—but Phil had immediately noticed a difference in the way Adeline kissed him.
Let’s hope it doesn’t get as far as kissing today, she thought, desperately wondering how to derail the guys’ plans. It made her queasy to watch Phil press her sister over the end of the pool table, dwarfing her as he laid his arms over hers to guide the first shot.
When the front door opened, Alice wanted to cry out in relief—except Dat and Uncle Jeremiah were both gazing purposefully at her, shaking their heads slightly. They paused in the doorway to take in the scene.
“Amish farmer dudes?” Dexter called out with a drunken laugh. “Hey, won’t you guys go to hell for being in a pool hall? We’re drinking and smoking and carrying on here! We’re baaad!”
From beneath Phil’s bulk, Adeline caught Alice’s eye while Dex heckled Dat and his brother. Alice quickly pressed a finger to her lips—and then pretended she had no idea who the two bearded men in black broad-brimmed hats and barn jackets could be.
Just one more favor, God, Alice prayed earnestly. Please let Phil and Dexter be too drunk to realize why two Amish men have just shown up—and who they are.
Chapter 22
It took all of Jude’s strength to keep his fists at his sides. The sight of an unkempt—and obviously drunk—blond fellow pinning his daughter to the pool table in a very suggestive position was enough to make him punch first and think later. When Jeremiah tweaked his coat sleeve, Jude inhaled the smoky air to settle his nerves. He reminded himself to follow the game plan he and his brother had formulated as they’d ridden here in the back of the sheriff’s cruiser, because it was the best way to insure that his girls stayed safe—and that he and Jeremiah did nothing they’d have to confess at church.
The smell of stale beer, cigarettes, and old walls that reeked of grease took him back to his rumspringa. Nothing’s changed, Jude noted as he quickly glanced around. You can pull this off if Rick doesn’t recognize you—and if the girls don’t give you away. Stick with the strategy Jeremiah suggested until Sheriff Banks comes inside.
Jeremiah assessed the two men with Alice and Adeline and went to the wall to choose a cue stick. “I could use a little quick cash,” he said above the wail of the jukebox. “What say you fellows team up and play me and my friend a little eight ball? Shall we go for fifty dollars a game?”
“Or shall we go for a hundred?” Jude picked out a cue stick and immediately dropped it, stalling so the sheriff would have time to search the gray pickup parked out front. He flashed a wide smile at the two young men. “Unless maybe you guys can’t scratch up fifty bucks apiece.”
“This should be good for a laugh,” the blond jeered as he straightened to his full height and reached into his jeans
