Hell Bound (Book 1): A Vacation From Hell (2 page)

              This hotel is so charming. It looks exactly like an old train station, like something out of an old western movie. It’s three stories high and for what I have read it supposedly was built in the early 1900’s; also it has been remodeled several times.

              All the hotel rooms are on the top two floors, and on the bottom floor there are ten different antique shops along with two museums that are about the hotel and the old railroad station.

              Lining the outside of the stores are dark cherry color oak wood benches, it’s so stunning.  Next to the benches there is a big wooden water bucket made for horses to drink from.

              At the end of the antique stores, there is an old building that stands alone from the hotel. It’s called Woody’s Saloon. “Look baby Woody’s Saloon.” I chuckle.

    “You would make that sound dirty.” Mathew giggles, as he tenderly kisses the top of my head.

              The saloon is not that big. Outside of the Saloon’s front door, there is a man wearing western style clothing with a long black trench coat. On the right side of his coat, just above the breast pocket there is a golden star, inside of the star in bulky letters it reads “Sheriff.” He turns to us and in a western accent says,

   “Howdy ya’ll.”

     “Hello.” We say back at the same time.

              “The saloon opens at seven every night and if you go to the building at the end next to the old grocery store you will find the Information Office. They will have brochures about the shows that will be playing and the show times as well.”

    “Thank you, sir,” Mathew replies.

      “Babe, could we go to the saloon and have some drinks later tonight if we have the time between the dinner and shows?”

   “Well, sweetheart let’s check it out and plan our day. A few drinks sound pretty good though.”

      Walking in the direction that the Sheriff showed us, I see the sign for the grocery store. The sign is rectangular with a faded white background and orange trim.

   The name of the grocery store is
Bob & Maci’s Mini Market
. There are food prices listed on the outside of the walls, lettuce is twenty five cents, bread is ten cents, it makes me feel like I’m living in the old western era.

        Next to the grocery store is the information center, just as the Sherriff told us. As we walk closer to the store I can see an old picture of a train in a glass frame that is hanging next to the front door. Next to the picture are several paragraphs giving a little bit of history about the town and the train that we will be riding in tomorrow to the Grand Canyon.

       Inside of the information building, there is a young woman standing behind the desk, she seems to be around mid twenty’s. She has a short boyish haircut, tall about 5’8, dressed up in an old western dress. She looks up from whatever she was writing on and politely greets us

    “Good evening, how may I help you folks today?”  

      “We are wondering about the dinner and show tonight?” Mathew politely asks the clerk.

  “The dinner is at Katie’s restaurant, which is four stores down to your left. Dinner starts at seven p.m. depending on your train tickets it might be free. Did you pay for the dinner with the tickets sir?”

     “Yup, we sure did.”

       I feel my phone vibrate in my purse and stop listening to their conversation. As I pull out my cell phone from the inside of my very messy purse, four text messages flash on the front screen of my phone, one from my mom, and three from Jennifer. Darn, it’s about time. As I am about to open the text messages, I hear Mathew say,

     “Ok, thank you very much.”

     We walk out of the building and Mathew asks,

     “So baby what you want to do?”

   “Well sweet cheeks, I say we take our luggage and go to our room and then we can come back and take a gander at all the stores.” 

  “Okay, sounds good to me.” Mathew agrees as he laughs at me.

  “What’s so funny Mathew?” I question him.

    “Have we been here that long already that you’re using phrases like “take a gander? It’s just funny that’s all. You’re talking like one of them.” He motions to the clerk in the information office and grabs my hand; leading the way to our hotel room.

      I have a chance to finally read my mom’s text message.

    
 
Sorry, it took me so long my phone was set on vibrate. I didn’t know you had text me. The kids are great; they are playing outside in the tree house with the dog.

I laugh as I start to punch a reply back to her.

      
 
Ok, thank you again, mom for watching them. Just letting you know we are here. It’s so adorable, I’ll show you pictures when we get back. Love you, kiss boys for us.

    
 
Next is Jennifer’s text message,

Not sure yet, today’s my day off. I’ll know tomorrow when I go in;I picked up a morning shif
t
.

            
 
We reach our room, which is on the second floor, room eighteen. While I’m waiting for my husband to slide the key card in the little black box on the door, I decide to quickly reply to Jennifer,

alrighty see you at wor
k
.

              Clicking the button on the side of my phone to silent, Mathew has opened the door and already put our bags down.   

       He comes out of the room and grabs me by my waist and effortlessly lifts me up and carries me inside the room. Kicking the door shut behind him with his foot.

   “Now let’s break in our bed,” Mathew says huskily, very gently laying me on our queen size bed, his warm lips kissing my neck.

       Wrapping my arms around his neck, enjoying the feel of his body against mine, I whisper in his ear, 

     “I love you Mathew, more than you will ever know.”

Chapter 3

You always have two choices,

Your commitment versus your fear

Sammy Davis

            
 
Eight thirty in the morning and we are slowly walking to the train depot which is located directly behind the hotel. I’ve never been on a train before so I’m beyond thrilled. And considering I’ve never been to the Grand Canyon, I get to experience two firsts in one day.

        There is a line of people waiting to board the train. A railroad employee, dressed in pinstriped overalls with a matching hat is walking the platform shouting,

     “Please have your tickets in hand and all bags must be checked before boarding the train.”

       Mathew has our tickets in his front pocket and I have a small backpack to carry my wallet and maybe some souvenirs. 

       I hope I can find something cute for the boys, even if it’s just a small toy or a t-shirt, either way they will be happy. As we slowly creep closer to the train, I can’t help but admiring how massive the train is.

              The brochure says that the locomotive is the original one. That would make the engine over Eighty years old. Wow, hopefully, they have kept up with the maintenance on that thing;
I think to myself, I would hate to get stranded out in the middle of nowhere.

              The boxcars on the train are also original and were used to carry different types of cargo such as mail, food, and wood, from town to town in 1932. In the 50’s the town was abandoned and eventually the train stopped running. In the 1960’s the little town was bought and remodel for a tourist attraction.

              They remodeled the train station along with the train itself, simply by slapping on some fresh paint on the engine and turning all the box cars into fully catered passenger cars, and decided to use it to travel to and from the Grand Canyon. 

              As we finally reach the front of the train, Mathew grabs my bag from me and shows the worker what’s inside. Mathew gets my bag back and hands it back to me. We leap on the train and look for an open seat in our boxcar.

              I notice there are two different sets of seats to choose from. First there are the single seats that face forward, and it seats two.

              The second set of seats face each other and appears it can fit a family of four comfortably. That seems like such a great way for a family to communicate with each other. We really should bring our boys here, no electronics, no video games or cartoons, just us spending some quality family time together.

              Mathew and I choose the front facing seats since there are only two of us. We have a tiny table in front of us. The table is a dark cherry brown color, with a very cute engraving of a flower on all four sides of the table. Big beautiful chandeliers hang from the middle of the boxcar and the walls have a dark cherry brown trim lining them.

              “This is so freaking cute! Can you believe they have a café cart?” I say in awe of the beautiful train. “The brochure said that sometime during the three hour train ride they will have a fake robbery occur on the train. Isn’t that so cute?”

              Mathew laughs and leans closer to me, sliding his arm around my shoulder. I lay my head on his chest, smelling his Ralph Lauren cologne.

    “It’s cute how amazed you are about the train. What do you say we grab coffee and a snack before they serve us our meal?”               

     “Well, once they say we can get up and walk around, we will go check out the café cart. I would like to capture some pictures too. I wonder which is better taking a plane or a train?” I question as I check out all of the passengers still getting on the train.

              “I would say a train ride is better because you can walk around and it isn’t as confined as it would be on a plane.”  

    “You know what you’re right.  It does seem like I have a lot of room to wiggle around.” I agree wiggling my butt around on the soft leather seats.

              My body jerks as the train starts to move, the tires start squealing. I look outside to see that we are slowly departing the train station.

              “Here we go,” I say excitingly, giving my husband a kiss on the cheek. I must have been beaming with excitement like a five year old when they get candy because Mathew smiles at me and laughs.

    “Alright let’s get some coffee,” Mathew says, walking in the direction of the sign that says café cart. 

              I’m looking around and loving every second of this old western train. It’s definitely worth the money, and something I would love to take our boys too.

              Three carts down we finally reach the café cart. There are long tables on each side of the train cart with one long bench on each side. Grabbing two spots at the end of the bench, Mathew walks up to the register to order our snacks.

              I stare at him, waiting in line to purchase our snack. How the hell did I get so lucky to land a sexy man like him? He’s 5’11 with short brown hair; he has a body every woman would just drool over.

              He tries so hard to stay in shape because of the military and it shows. I’m surprised he’s even getting a cinnamon roll with me today. He is such a health freak. I don’t mind though, he helps me stay in shape.

              He starts walking back to me with two coffee cups and two cinnamon rolls. Yummy! This man knows the way to my heart. I must have been staring because he walks up with a big goofy smile.

    “See something you like?” 

    “Yup, I sure do! My cinnamons roll!” I say jokingly.

              He sits next to me, putting the coffee cups and cinnamon rolls down on the table in front of us, and we strike up a conversation. Enjoying each other’s company and letting the world roll by and our stress fly out the window.  It feels so good to sit and talk and not get interrupted every second by our boys.

              After an hour of enjoying our snack and small talk we decide it’s time to walk back to our seats.

              While we are walking back I notice some of the passengers standing up and pointing toward the front of the train. “What’s everyone looking at,” I ask Mathew.

    “I’m not sure, but they seem worried.”

       As I’m about to ask one of the passengers closest to us, I hear a loud blast of air as the train’s emergency brakes were applied and a screeching noise coming from the train tires.

              I feel a jerk and the next thing I know Mathew and I fall to the ground.    

    “What the Hell was that?” I question trying to get to my feet.

       “I don’t know,” Mathew answers, nervously.

              Leaning down and grabbing my bag from the floor I ask, “Did we hit something?” I say loudly to the other passengers around us.

              The Intercom interrupts and politely the conductor announces,

        “We are sorry for the sudden stop but there is an emergency outside and we would like everyone to sit down in their assigned seats. We will keep everyone notified as we know more. Thank you very much for your patients.”

              Grabbing Mathew’s hand and sitting down I try to cram my head as close to our window as possible. Trying to see what’s outside on the tracks.

              But all we see are bushes, trees, and mountains, nothing but the dessert landscape. We aren’t close enough to the front of the train to see what has caused us to stop.                      

        “Something big must have been on the tracks, we stopped fast,” Mathew whispers to me.