up in his driveway, he was somewhat surprised. She had said she wanted a hotel, but after a day of checking around, she’d likely realized it would cost a fortune. With the leaves turning and the air now crisp and clean, Missoula was inundated with tourists willing to pay high hotel rates.
“Is that Joan?” Kyle asked.
Gideon pushed away from the laptop he had placed on the dining room table next to Kyle and his homework. “It is.”
“She’s come to stay in the apartment?”
“I think so.” If she was a target, Gideon liked the idea of having her near. He already knew he would be sleeping with one eye open until she left town.
“Is she going to eat with us?” Kyle asked. “It seems like the polite thing to do.”
“Yes, it does.” He watched Joan hoist her backpack on her shoulder and run her fingers through her short hair. It had been longer in college, soft as silk, and as thick as a horse’s mane. He had liked the way it skimmed the top of her breasts when she was on top of him.
He shoved the memory aside, recalling that her hair had been scorched in the College Fire and that she had cropped it short. Why she had kept it that way over the years, he did not know, but it seemed to suit the person she was now.
Her head bowed, she glanced at her phone and then walked up to the front door. Kyle moved past him, opening it just as she’d rung the bell.
When she looked at Kyle, Gideon sensed she was again searching for signs of Helen. He was not sure how he would have reacted if he were staring at a child Joan had given birth to just nine months after they had broken up.
“Hey, kid,” she said with a smile. “Have you gotten taller since I saw you last?”
Kyle rose up a fraction. “People don’t grow that fast.”
“Grown people don’t, but ten-year-olds do.” She scrutinized him. “Yep, definitely taller.”
Kyle wrinkled his nose. “You smell like smoke.”
“I can’t seem to shake the smell.”
“Come on inside,” Gideon said. “I can give you something to wear while we run your clothes through the washer.”
She tightened her hand on the strap of her backpack, and he wondered if she was remembering the times when she’d worn his shirt as they’d sat together on a rare Sunday morning drinking coffee and doing homework.
“Sounds like a plan.” Joan stepped inside and looked around at the vaulted ceiling. “Nice place. Wasn’t this your grandfather’s house?”
“Good memory. It was the original house on the property. My dad and mom built their own place after they married. That’s where Ann lives now.”
“Ah. You were right about hotel prices. Ouch.”
“We’re known for our sticker shock,” he said.
“Offer still open to crash?” she asked.
“It is,” he said.
Joan gripped her backpack’s worn strap. “Can you show me where you want me? And I’ll get out of your hair. I don’t want to intrude more than I have.”
“I can take her to the garage apartment,” Kyle offered.
“We’ll both go,” Gideon said.
“A formal escort,” she said. “I like it.”
The trio moved through the house and out the back door. Across a large graveled area, he led her to the three-car garage and the side door that led to the apartment.
They climbed the stairs to the second floor, and he switched on the light. The apartment, which extended across the top of the garage, had been his home for several years after his divorce. He had been strapped financially, and his grandfather needed an extra set of eyes on him, so it had worked out for everyone. When he subsequently inherited the property, it had been good for Kyle to have a firm home base.
The apartment was almost twelve hundred square feet. There were two bedrooms, with a bathroom, a small kitchen, and a living area with a wide-screen television and overstuffed sofas. It was decorated solely to a man’s taste.
“Wow, some garage,” Joan said. “I was thinking tiny.”
“It’s Montana,” Gideon said.
She smiled. “Right.”
“Dad said when I’m a teenager, I can live here,” Kyle said.
“Dad said he would think about it,” Gideon said easily.
“That’s only three years away,” Kyle pointed out.
“I’m very aware,” Gideon said, feeling his age. “Joan, there are extra clothes in the front bedroom, in the dresser. Plenty of soap and shampoo, towels, the whole deal in the bathroom.”
She walked to the back door and stared out its window. “Don’t suppose you have a fire escape?”