Gordon arrived not long after the proposal. He accepted a plate of food from Jackie and sat in the dining room to eat as everyone joined him. Post-dinner cake, coffee, and iced tea made the rounds.
When Gordon looked up from his food, he saw the collar on Chase’s wrist. “Interesting accessory you have there. Trying to start a new trend?”
Chase held up his hand and waggled it, making the collar slide around. “This is my engagement collar, I’ll have you know. Be nice.”
“Engagement? Really?” He looked from Chase to Annie for confirmation and smiled. “I thought you people were more giddy than usual. I’ll be damned.”
“Probably,” Chase agreed with a grin. “So what have you been up to? Any word yet on your reinstatement?”
He laid down his fork. “Yeah. It’s not happening.”
“Oh, Gordon, no,” Beth said. “Surely Bledsoe doesn’t have that kind of clout.”
“Apparently he does. I could go back to the Bureau, but they were going to reassign me to an outpost in Alaska or something similar. I said no thanks. I’d become somewhat disillusioned with my job before this whole mess. I’m not devastated to have walked.”
Ethan shook his head. “I would think, given the revelations with Travis Tyler, that Bledsoe would feel somewhat remorseful.”
“Not even close,” Gordon said. “It made him look bad. He was counting on using Chase’s figurative hanging for Kiely’s murder as a political card. When that was taken away, all his self-righteous prognosticating about catching her killer fell flat. He can’t do anything to Chase directly, so he took aim at the nearest thing. Me.”
He took the pitcher of tea and refilled his glass. “On the good news front, it looks like they’re building a pretty strong case against Travis. With the DNA from all the cases across the Midwest, never mind the kidnapping, he’s going away for life at least—possibly even the death penalty. His sentencing is a formality at this point.”
“Wyatt said he’s paralyzed from the waist down,” Jason said. “For a strong man like that, being incapacitated is going to be a prison of its own. No more than he deserves, in my opinion.”
“I’m so thankful he didn’t die,” Annie said. “As much as he deserves to rot in hell, I’d hate to have been the one who sent him there.”
Chase put his arm around her and pulled her close. “So where does this leave you, Gordon?”
“I don’t know.” He stretched his arms over his head. “I’ve been working, in school, or in the service since I was eighteen. I only took the minimum time off when Mallory died. I think I’ll take a little while and relax, figure out what to do next.”
“I didn’t know you were in the military,” Beth said. “When?”
Gordon smiled. “Back when I was a kid. It was the Army or jail. I chose the Army.”
“I never would have guessed it of you,” Ethan said, grinning. “All this time, I thought you were just a pretty-boy lawyer.”
Picking up his glass, Gordon saluted him with an answering grin. “You are looking at the one-time champion of boosting cars in Clay County, Kentucky.”
“See, I told you that you had more in common with him than you thought,” Beth told her husband, then looked at Gordon. “Though I didn’t know you were quite that incorrigible.”
“Incorrigible? Auto theft is ‘incorrigible,’ she says.” Jason shook his head. “I’ll remind you of that someday, sis. So are you going to stick around these parts or what?” he asked Gordon.
“I don’t know. I’d like to travel some, I think. Go where the spirit leads me for a while, not have to answer to anyone. Maybe work with my hands again. I don’t want to get too soft, which was a real danger with my job.”
Chase laughed. “You’re talking construction, right? Not boosting cars?”
When they had met in college, Gordon was making ends meet by working construction on the weekends.
“Yes, construction. I’ve always had this secret desire to build a house. Who knows? Maybe I’ll get a little wanderlust out of my system then come back here and start my own construction company.”
For a while longer, they sat around the table chatting. Eventually though, Gordon had to head back to Louisville. Chase walked him out.
“Are you going to keep your house?” Chase asked as they reached Gordon’s car.
“Probably not, but I’m not in a rush to do anything. It became nothing more than a resting place after Mallory died. It was always more her house than mine. I think when I do come back, I’ll settle here in Leroy. Think that would be okay?”
Chase smiled. “I think that would be great. Then I can watch you and Stacy dance around each other and tease you unmercifully the way you did me.”
Gordon laughed. “You do that. Listen, what are you going to do with your condo once you get the house fixed up?”
“Rent it out. Market’s too soft to sell it right now. Why?”
“Tell you what—let me rent it. I’ll be about six weeks getting things in order. You should have the house ready by then, right? I think it’d be a good solution for both of us.”
Chase nodded. “Probably. Let’s get closer to the date, and we’ll talk.” He held out a hand to Gordon. “I don’t know if I ever said it properly or not, but I owe you one. You saved my bacon at great risk and cost to yourself. I don’t know how I can ever repay you.”
Gordon clasped his hand warmly. “You want to repay me? Be happy. Since I’ve known you, you’ve had this cloud over your head. It’s gone now. Take advantage of that.”
“I fully plan on doing that,” Chase assured him. “Things could have been so different. I won’t let this chance slip away from me.”
As Gordon departed, Chase turned back to the house. Jason, Beth, and Annie were coming outside, Ethan, Hannah, and Paulo close behind. As he watched Annie chat with Beth, he smiled, feeling all the pieces of his heart settle into place. The day that had started out so miserably had turned out to be beautiful after all, and he wasn’t going to waste another minute of it worrying about a past long dead and gone.
Keep reading for a sneak peek
at Injustice, the next book in the Olman County series, available now.