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“It’ll be harder when they’re in Helena.”
I slanted a hard gaze at him, and he shrugged unfazed. I rolled my eyes. “Grayson’s gotten a lot better.” Thanks to Tova. “I don’t want him to go back to school where everyone assumes he’ll have problems.”
“You don’t have to explain it to me.”
“Don’t I?” I had to explain it to everyone I came across. Aggie often gave me a guarded look, and she’d been the one to urge me to take some time and get away with Grayson and Ivy before they left. I knew she was hoping I would change my mind.
There was Tova’s carefully blank reaction. And now Wilder.
Would Austen and Eliot have opinions?
Of course they fucking would. They were Knights.
Wilder’s radio squelched. He turned away and spoke into the handset clipped by his collar. When he spun back, he lifted his chin. “See you in the morning. I’ve gotta go deal with a stolen pickup.”
“Is crime getting that bad?”
He grimaced. “Goddamn oil fields. Guys think they can make money in the middle of nowhere while breaking laws. But no, this time it’s Guy McCormick. He’s got dementia, refuses to be put into a home, and then argues with his wife. This is the third time this week his pickup hasn’t been stolen. Delilah sold it three years ago.”
Guy and Delilah McCormick had lived in the same house by the elementary school since well before I was born. I didn’t envy Wilder for dealing with a couple we grew up getting lemonade and cookies from. “See you in the morning. Bright and early.”
He hopped in his sheriff’s department SUV and took off. I faced the house that was supposed to feel like coming home, and instead, I was full of trepidation. Looming in front of me was an imposing, two-story farmhouse with a wraparound porch and an equally expansive deck on the back that faced the valley on Knight land but was as close to town as possible. Despite the bushy trees and sparse brush on the property, the house was fairly isolated. The closest neighbor was over half a mile away, heralding the outskirts of town.
When I thought of this place since Meg’s death, it was with cool detachment. A structure to hang my hat in and store all my kids’ belongings. I’d rather work in the office at the ranch than in the house, and we were too isolated for the kids to have neighborhood kids who could hop a fence or ride a bike over. I wasn’t sure how to feel about being here. What kind of mind-fuck would it be to walk into a home I shared with my wife and lust after the nanny?
I came to Buffalo Gully with a plan. Tova could hang with the kids while I got a few groceries for the four days and three nights we’d be here. When we weren’t sleeping, we’d be at the ranch.
Solid plan, Cody.
I went to the front door. The porch didn’t creak like the one in town, and Wilder had stopped by to crank the AC. I could finally get a decent night’s sleep. As if rising heat and an old air-conditioning unit were why I wasn’t sleeping well.
Walking through the house, I didn’t look around. I knew what I’d see and where everything was. This house was no longer a home. We had slept here. We had eaten here. We’d all spent a ton of time at the hospital in Billings and then hospice.
For a heartbeat, I envied the kids for leaving at the end of the summer. They could go to a home without all the heavy memories. Without the mantle of “what-ifs” and “should’ve beens.”
I followed the voices to Grayson’s bedroom. Tova was holding the long neck of an old Epiphone guitar.
She lifted her gaze to mine, her eyes filled with question and awe. “He said this is your old guitar. Does that mean you play?”
“Would you believe I learned to impress a girl?”
She laughed. “I’m sensing a theme.”
I craved her smile and drank her in like a man who hadn’t had a drop of water all week. I’d barely had a drop of her, deliberately abstaining from all things Tova since that torturous phone call.
Yet I wasn’t putting up a fight in my house.
“He was teaching me to play,” Grayson said matter-of-factly, “but the noise hurt Mommy’s head.”
Tova flinched but recovered quickly. She gave Grayson an understanding smile. “That was thoughtful of you to store it so nicely in your closet so she could feel better.”
“Can I learn to play?” Ivy asked.
Grayson had been close to Ivy’s age when I’d started working with him. We’d only managed a few hours here and there, but that was all he’d needed. What the kid lacked in athleticism, he made up for with musical talent. Just like the dancing. He had coordination when paired with a tune. Perhaps the noise helped him concentrate.
“It’s my guitar.” Grayson angrily reached for the instrument. Tova released her hold like she was afraid to damage it. “He said I could keep it in my room.”
“Grayson,” I said, sensing a meltdown. No one would blame him. We were back in an environment that was so damn familiar yet just as foreign as another rented house. “Remember how excited you were to learn? Ivy is, too, and I’d love to teach both of you someday, but it’s not happening this weekend because we’re here to help Uncle Eliot.”
