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 by the splash of what sounded like washing hands. A miracle. As he tugged off his sidearm and placed it in a lockbox in the entryway table drawer, he heard the microwave door open and then close with a hard bang. The boy was heavy-handed in just about everything, and Gideon knew every appliance in this house would be worn out by the time Kyle left for college.
Gideon removed his boots, placed them beside his son’s, and rolled his head from side to side. He came into the living room and switched on the television as Kyle removed a bowl from the cabinet. The replay featured the Washington Redskins versus the Philadelphia Eagles game. A couple of East Coast teams. Too bad the Denver Broncos weren’t playing.
The boy settled near him and offered him the bowl. Gideon scooped up a large handful of popcorn and ate it and then another. Hungrier than he imagined, Gideon realized he had been going nonstop for more than twenty-four hours.
As he watched the game, his thoughts drifted away from downs, penalties, and scores to Joan. She had given him a quick synopsis of what had happened in Philadelphia, but he wanted the entire story.
As the boy watched the game with keen interest, he reached for his phone. Over the last ten years, he had been tempted to look her up again, and had done so, but after a while, he’d stopped. There had been plenty of good reasons not to. But she had come back. Not to him, maybe, but to Missoula.
With one eye on the game and the other on the phone, he typed in Detective Joan Mason, Philadelphia. The third search result led with the headline COP PUT ON PAID SUSPENSION. The article was dated September 4.
Kyle’s eyes were drifting shut. A few more minutes and the kid would be out like a light. He read through the article detailing the case of Avery Newport, who had been charged with burning down her home. Her roommate had died in the fire. Joan’s name did appear in an article about police bias, which quoted unnamed sources who detailed the College Fire and the earlier one in her family’s apartment. Unnamed sources told the reporter about the letters to Elijah. Who would have known about their connection? Knowing Joan, that left Elijah and someone in the prison system. Newport’s attorney must have been worried about Joan’s investigation. Otherwise, why bother with the hit job?
Going back further in the articles, he scrolled through the few mentions of her citations and awards. She was a high-profile cop.
And now Joan was in his jurisdiction. Looking for what? The justice unattainable in Philadelphia? Closure? Redemption? It certainly was not for him.
He laid his phone facedown on the couch and glanced toward his son. Kyle had fallen asleep, the remote in his hand. If things had gone differently between Joan and him, there would be no Kyle.
Life had given him two paths, and he was sorry he could not have taken both.
The arsonist squatted by the ring of stones glistening in the moonlight. The night sky was crystal clear, and the stars twinkled above. In the center of the stones, a tripod of sticks leaned lazily against each other. Beneath the small spire was a gathering of dry leaves and shaved bark.
He struck the match in his hand, savoring the brief scent of flint, and then watched the fire blaze bright and tall at the end of the match. The flame swayed in a hypnotic dance. The play of colors seductively spoke to him and whispered promises no woman ever had. He grew hard.
The flame burned down, scorching the tips of his fingers. He held tight to the match, absorbing the pain until the flame had died. He dropped it on the makeshift pyramid of wood, struck another match, and then tossed it on the kindling.
A small flame appeared, and the fibrous strands crackled and glowed. He blew on the smoldering tinder, which greedily accepted his nourishing breath. The flames nibbled at the kindling and then gorged on larger pieces of wood.
His creation grew stronger and hotter by the moment. Gently, he laid a larger piece of wood on the fire as he looked toward the brittle brush blanketing the forest bed beyond the circle of rocks. It would not take much to release his creation into the wild. Given the steady wind and the dry undergrowth, it would dance up and down the mountainside, destroying all in its path within hours.
He sat back on a large stump and poked the fire with a stick from his pile. The embers crackled and floated around like fireflies.
As tempting as it was to let his mistress destroy it all, he had to be careful. With Joan Mason back in town, caution was essential. He had important work to do, and he refused to let her stop him.
CHAPTER TEN
Missoula, Montana
Monday, September 7, 2020
8:50 a.m.
Despite the extra sleep, Joan was still exhausted and overcaffeinated when she arrived at the medical examiner’s office at the state crime lab on Palmer Street. The air’s crispy coolness had her hunkering down deeper into Ann’s coat, which smelled faintly of cinnamon and rose perfume. Look up the word perfect in the dictionary, and Ann’s smiling face was sure to be right by the definition. Ann’s flawlessness contrasted with Joan’s chaos-strewn life and was plunging her deeper into her dark mood.
She crossed the parking lot to the front double doors. Normally, she would have reached for her Philadelphia detective’s shield and hung it from her neck, but she hesitated, knowing now was not the time to draw attention to her outsider status. She opted to wait.
Gideon’s car pulled up and parked. He strode toward her with long, fast strides. “Do you have warm gloves?”
She resisted the urge to rub her hands. “It’s still summer back east.”
“Montana doesn’t give a shit about back east. Borrow a pair from Ann.” Gideon opened the door and waited for her to pass. He nodded to the short woman with a round face at the reception desk. “Marge, how did you end up pulling duty today?”
“Cursed, I suppose,” Marge said, deadpan. “You?”
His grin was easy and quick. “Same. I’d like you to meet Detective Joan Mason. She’s consulting with me on this case.”
Marge regarded Joan with a mixture of curiosity and suspicion. “Nice to meet you, Detective Mason.”
“Please call me Joan.”
“Joan, where are you from?”
“Philadelphia.”
“That’s a long way.”
“I’m here on vacation. I’m friends with Ann Bailey.”
Marge’s expression softened. “Well, you should have said so. How do you know Ann?”
“We went to college together.”
Marge’s head tilted a fraction. “You were her roommate during the College Fire.”
First Becca and now Marge were proof the past was always near. “That’s right.”