“I hope we make it in time,” Nora said, dismayed. Driving to Atlanta would take days. “We’ve still got to get gas, check out tires, pack, maybe breathe for five minutes—”
“You could always fly with me.”
Nora glanced at him like he’d just offered her a backstage pass to meet the Rolling Stones. “Let me guess—you have a private jet stashed off the highway, and it’s calledThe Dumas.”
“I wish.” Joe chuckled, showing off his dimple. “Just a generous pilot uncle who has a deep affection for his charming and underpaid nephew.”
“Think our car will fit on the plane?” she teased.
Before Joe could answer, her mother returned, sliding onto the stool beside her and immediately digging into a syrupy stack of pancakes like she was in a competitive eating contest.
Joe tossed a ten-dollar bill on the counter, the edge curling from being tucked in a sweaty wallet too long. “That should cover all three,” he said. Then he looked at Nora, his fingers brushing her arm. Just a squeeze. Gentle, sure. But her whole chest lit up like a pinball machine.
“I’ll see you ladies in Atlanta, and if I secure an interview, I’ll try to make it closer to when you arrive. Otherwise, I’ll ask the Dame for a meeting for you both.”
And then he was gone—vanishing out the door and into the warm, chaotic hum of postconcert escapees like a character exiting stage left in one of her short stories. She stared at the swinging diner door and smiled. She’d been waiting for an idea to write about. And maybe, just maybe, her story had finally started.
“Very generous of him to help. He seems like a nice young man,” her mother said between bites, eyes on the pancakes like she was trying to absorb them into her bloodstream.
“I think he is.” Nora tried to play it cool though her cheeks warmed.
“And he’s cute,” Leanne added, in a singsong voice that mothers have been using to torture their daughters since the dawn of time.
“Mom!” Nora gasped, rolling her eyes with dramatic flair, but her insides had gone all soft, syrupy, like the pancakes Leanne was devouring. She pictured Joe’s dimple, that teasing smirk, the way he looked at her like she wasn’t just another girl in a crowd but a character in a story he wanted to write an article about.
“I’m so glad he’s going to help us get to Grandma in Atlanta.”
“Atlanta, huh?” The way her mom asked mid-chew was like Nora had casually suggested driving to Havana rather than Georgia.
“Yup.”
Leanne exhaled and sat back. “Then we better get a good night’s sleep.”
Nora agreed. With all the adrenaline flushed from their bodies after the race to get out of the stadium, exhaustion was setting in deep. “We only have a few chapters left ofThe Godfather. We should finish that up tonight, and tomorrow, I’m cracking openThe Love Machine.”
Leanne crunched a piece of bacon between her teeth. “Don’t get any ideas about Joe Dumas being Robin Stone.”
Nora pushed back her unfinished coffee, wishing she’d ordered a Coca-Cola instead. “Who’s Robin Stone?”
Leanne wiggled her brows in a teasing way that seemed natural at the same time it was foreign. Leanne wasn’t the teasing type, yet she’d opened up so much on this trip since they’d left New York. “He’stheLove Machine.”
“Mom!” Nora’s mind flashed to the cover of her mother’s risqué novel, and she couldn’t help teasing. “But what if he is?”
Leanne gave a theatrical gasp, and Nora pressed her hand to her mouth just in time to keep from spraying coffee out her nose. Across the booth, her mom actually laughed—like, really laughed—and for the first time in forever, everything felt light.
Just two women, some bacon, a possibly magical boy, and a road map to Atlanta to find the woman who’d put them on this journey.
Part ThreeSouthern Heat
Summer 1969
Chapter Twenty-Two
Somewhere between midnight and trouble—or Denver and Atlanta—hurtling down the dusty spine of the interstate in a van that smelled faintly of patchouli and unwashed denim, Eleanor Bell, a.k.a. Mama Lightning, if the band’s enthusiastic renaming had anything to say about it, was rewriting the set list for Shep Moon’s band.
The boys were still laughing over how she’d cut three of their psychedelic filler tracks, declaring, “You can’t groove if you can’t remember what key you’re in, sweetheart.”
Now they were running through the revised order in harmony, vocals overlapping like kids around a campfire, Shep strumming the guitar while the drummer kept beat with his sticks on the back of the seat. Eleanor sang along with them, her voice warmed up from days on the road and laced with that smoky edge that had started to feel like her own again. Her mind was sharp today, and she was taking advantage of the lifted fog, unsure how long it would last.
