“Oh, right.” She fumbled wet, gloved fingers into her pocket and produced a key ring attached to a worn purple macramé fob that had been her lucky charm since middle school.
The hands took the keys and opened the front door. A rush of heat greeted her, sending a shiver of pleasure through her body. She stumbled inside, vowing not to leave the house until spring.
The hands stripped off her coat and snatched off her hat. The items were hung by the door in a careful row on horseshoe hangers.
“You better get out of those clothes.”
She peeled off her gloves and dropped them on the floor as she toed off her shoes. Her fingers were beet red and trembled slightly as she moved toward a radiator and held them close.
“Thanks,” she said.
“That was stupid.”
“I know.” She turned to face her savior and looked up into the familiar gray eyes of Elijah Weston.
His cheeks were rosy from the cold and his overcoat covered in snow. “Where did you come from?”
A brow arched, amused. “Funny, I was thinking the same question.”
She shrugged, staggered a step.
He looked around the entryway, seemed to absorb every detail, and then moved toward the door. “See you in class on Monday.”
That distant memory had been lost to Joan for years, and it was funny she recalled it now. Elijah had saved her on that night. But where had he come from? He did not live in the neighborhood, and the campus was several blocks away.
Her drunken, addled mind had not had the desire to seek the answer then. But now she realized Elijah must have been watching her.
Human memories were a tricky thing. Trauma, alcohol, and time had a way of altering the story and imposing impressions gathered from other life events that happened days, months, or years later. She had witnessed this on her job and always took eyewitness testimony with a healthy grain of salt. If Joan were to have interviewed herself about this, she might have called bullshit on it all. You were drunk. It was dark and snowing heavily.
She started the car’s engine, chasing away a chill worming its way into her bones. Given her experience, she knew she should not trust the memory. “It was Elijah. Right?”
By eight thirty in the evening, Gideon had learned from Becca that Lana Long had an arrest record in Denver. Most of her offenses were minor, including two drug-possession charges and one arrest for vandalism. She had been charged with setting fire to a trash can, and the fire had done several thousand dollars’ worth of damage to the adjoining structure. The property owner had dropped the charges.
As he pulled up to the ranch, he saw the rental car parked in Ann’s driveway. He half hoped to see Joan, but there was no sign of her when Ann answered the door and called to Kyle.
“Are you doing all right?” Gideon asked.
“I’m fine.”
“What’s your take on Joan?” he asked.
“She’s the same in many ways, and yet different. She’s just as guarded as she used to be. Did she tell you her family home caught fire when she was in middle school?”
“She skimmed over it.”
“I’ll bet money the College Fire dredged up a lot of old memories. If she were my patient, I’d be treating her for PTSD.”
He had been convinced he and Joan could have solved their problems, until the fire. Now he understood that her running away wasn’t all because of him. “Where is she now?” Gideon asked gruffly.
“Sleeping. Time change, nerves, the case back east, and travel all caught up.”
“Sleep was the one time she ever seemed to be at peace.”
“Have you talked to her about the College Fire?”
“No.”
Kyle appeared at the top of the stairs. “Dad, can I stay the night?”
“No. We sleep in our own beds tonight.” Sleepovers did not happen unless he had a late-night shift. He and his boy had spent too many nights separated, and they sure were not going to spend unnecessary ones apart.
“Dad, you’re not being fair,” Kyle said as he stomped around the house.
“Life isn’t fair, pal.”
“You always say that.”
“Get your gear.”
“Fine.” Heavy, dramatic footsteps faded away.
“You owe it to yourself and Joan to talk, Gideon.”
“There’s been a lot of water under the bridge, Ann.”
“Not as much as you think.”
Kyle appeared, and the two drove the short distance to their home. As he walked through the front door of the one-story rancher, Gideon shrugged off his coat, grateful to shut out the world for a few hours. He had become accustomed to the quiet in the backcountry, when all he and Kyle had had to worry about was finding a good fishing spot or splitting logs. Now, he was discovering that balancing the job and single parenthood was trickier than he’d ever thought. He had hoped the time spent at the fishing cabin would reset their relationship, but father and son seemed to be falling back into their old patterns. The kid complained, and Gideon grumbled back, sounding more and more like his old man every day.
“Do I have to go to bed?” Kyle kicked off his boots, leaving them discarded on the floor.
Gideon glared at the shoes. “Put ’em back proper.”
Kyle stopped short of rolling his eyes, which he knew now earned him a confiscated phone, but he came damn close as he released a pained sigh and straightened his boots.
“And hang the coat up on the peg.”
Kyle yanked off his coat as if it had offended him and hung it up.
The attitude needed work, but Gideon was not in a mood for a fight tonight. “How about you pop some popcorn in the microwave, and we’ll watch a little preseason football.”
“For real?”
“You can get by on one less hour of sleep, right?”
“Yeah.”
He took his son’s positive tone as a sign of hope. “Good. Get the kind that has the butter and salt on it, not the healthy stuff Ann gave us.”
Nodding, Kyle headed off into the kitchen. The tap turned on, followed
