In Sheep's Clothing

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Six

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Chapter Thirty

Discussion Questions

Prologue

If the train trudged any slower into the station, American missionary Gracie Benson would be dead by sunset. Five minutes. Twenty steps. Then she’d be safely aboard.

God obviously wasn’t on her side. Not today, at least.

Then again, He certainly didn’t owe her any favors. Not after her fruitless two years serving as a missionary in Russia.

Gracie purposely kept her gaze off heaven as she hunched her shoulders and pulled the woolly brown scarf over her forehead. Please, please let this Russian peasant guise work. The train huffed its last, then belched, and Gracie jumped. Hold it together, Grace. Long enough to fool the conductor, and find her berth on the train for Vladivostok. Then she could finally slam the compartment door on this horrific day—no, on this entire abysmal chapter of her life. So much for finding redemption as a missionary in Russia. She’d settle for getting out of the country alive.

She tensed, watching an elderly man dressed in the typical Russian garb of worn, fake leather jacket, wool pants and a fraying beret gather his two canvas duffels and shuffle across the cement platform. Would he recognize her and scream, “Foreigner!” in the tongue that now drove fear into her bones?

Without a glance at her, he joined the throng of other passengers moving toward the forest-green passenger cars. A younger man, dressed mafia-style in a crisp black leather jacket and suit pants, fell in behind the old man. Gracie stiffened. Had he looked her way? Help me, Lord!

Just because God wasn’t listening didn’t mean she couldn’t ask. The irony pricked her eyes with tears. This morning’s events had whittled down her list of trustworthy souls in Russia to a fine point. She’d give all the rubles in her pocket for someone like her cousin, Chet, FBI agent extraordinaire, to yank her out of this nightmare into safety.

Not that she should give any man a chance to introduce himself before decking him. She’d been down that road once. Never was too soon to trust another man within arm’s distance.

Gracie shuffled forward, in keeping with her disguise of tired village maiden. She clutched a worn nylon bag in one hand—her black satchel safely tucked inside—and fisted the folds of her headscarf with the other. As the smell of diesel fuel and dust soured the breathable air and cries of goodbye from well-wishing relatives, grief pooled in Gracie’s chest. Poor Evelyn.

Biting it back, Gracie cast a furtive glance beyond the crowd and caught sight of a militia officer. The soldier, dressed in muddy green fatigues, an AK-47 hung over his shoulder like a fishing basket, leaned lazily against a cement column, paying her no mind.

Hope lit inside her. Freedom beckoned from the open train door.

Stepping up to the conductor, she handed the woman her wadded ticket. The conductor glared at her as she unfolded the slip of paper. Gracie dropped her gaze and acted servile, her heart in her throat. Please, please. The conductor paused only a moment before punching the ticket and moving aside.

The train resonated with age in the smell of hot vinyl and polished wood. The body odor of previous passengers clung to the walls, and grime crusted the edges of a brown linoleum floor. Gracie bumped along the narrow corridor until she found her compartment. She’d purchased a private berth with the intent of slamming the door, locking it from inside and not cracking it open until she reached Vladivostok. The U.S. Consulate, only ten minutes from the train station, meant safety and escape from the nightmare.

Escape from the memories. Surely Evelyn’s killer wouldn’t follow Gracie to America.

Tossing her satchel onto the lower bunk, Gracie untied the headscarf and shook out her shoulder-length damp hair. Blowing out a deep, shuddering breath she willed her pulse to its regular rhythm.

So maybe she’d been too hard on God. He had gotten her this far. Perhaps He hadn’t turned his back, completely, on Gracie Benson, a.k.a. foreign-missionary-flop-turned-fugitive.

Gracie grabbed the handle and began to roll the door shut.

A man’s black shoe jammed into the crack.

“No!” Grace stomped on it with her hiking boot. The assailant grunted and yanked his foot back. She threw all her weight into the door. “Get away!”

An arm snaked through the opening and slammed the door back, nearly ripping off Gracie’s hands. She stumbled back onto the bunk, fumbled for her bag.

How had he found her? “Get out!”

Gracie’s heart lodged in her throat. The man was huge. Dark eyes, knotted brow, muscles and menace in a tweed jacket, he stomped into her compartment.

She screamed and flung her bag at him with all her five-foot-two-inch, one-hundred-and-twenty-pound strength.

He sidestepped and caught it.