Page 9 of Gideon

“I guess not. I thought I knew you, but I was wrong.”

“Your name’s Nikki.”

“Yes.”

He searched his memory but couldn’t come up with anyone named Nikki from his past. She looked like she was probably five or so years younger than him. That would have made her around twelve when he left the first time, and he hadn’t been around long enough to have run into her that last time.

“I’m really sorry. I can’t think of where we met.” Her cheeks were tinged with pink. “I don’t mean to embarrass you.”

“I’m not embarrassed,” she said, moving back behind her table. “Don’t worry about it.”

“What’s your last name?”

“What difference does that make?”

“I’m sorry for how things turned out. I only wanted to help.”

“Got it. Thanks. Bye.”

“If that’s what you want.”

“It is.”

Gideon nodded and left. It was time to face his dad anyway. But after that encounter, his confidence had depleted. Not how he wanted this next meeting to begin.

Chapter 4

Nikki droppedher head after Gideon walked away. She wanted to call out to him and apologize. She shouldn’t have treated him like that. But when he’d shown up completely out of the blue when she needed help the most, she’d thought he was God’s answer to her prayer. She’d been wrong, but that wasn’t Gideon’s fault. She just wished his presence hadn’t bolstered her defiance. Her initial intention had been to pay Cole after she told him what she thought, hoping it would sow a seed that maybe would help him begin to see the unfairness of it all. But then when she had help, she’d thought it was her way out of it.

God, is this your way of telling me all I need in this fight is you?

She should have known better than to put her trust in someone who, for all intents and purposes, was a stranger, even if he didn’t feel like one. He may not have noticed her as a girl—and there was no reason he would have—but she’d noticed him. A lot of the girls in townhad. He was a bad boy from the wrong side of the tracks, and he had the good looks to go with it, but that wasn’t what drew her to him all those years ago. She knew a deeper truth about him that very few did. Maybe that was wrong. She shouldn’t base her emotions on a sense of superiority because she held his secret. It didn’t mean he owed her anything.

Having him return after being in the special forces, despite the limp she noticed, had given her hope that finally someone had come who could actually do something. It was a momentary lapse in judgment that saw her hopes raised, then dashed. But she’d been through worse.

For all her rebelling at the extra fees, she was in a much stronger position than most people in this town, some of whom relied on the markets to buy them food throughout the week. For her, it meant they could have a few extra nice things. That was until she had to give half her profit away.

“Humility, right?” she mumbled. “You’re teaching me humility? Or is it character building? Either way, I don’t like it.”

If she was going to lose her money, she’d rather give it to someone who really needed it. Now all she wanted to do was pack up and go home.

Gideon banged on the door to his dad’s place for the third time. He’d driven by the bar and confirmed they hadn’t opened yet, but his dad still wasn’t answering.

He lifted his fist to bang again when a muffled shout came through the door. “I’m coming!”

A couple of thumps were followed by several swear words, then the lock jiggled, and the door opened. Joey stood in the doorway wearing a stained T-shirt and a pair of baggy briefs. “Oh, it’s you.”

Gideon lifted his eyes up the side of the building. “You should put on clothes before you answer the door, Dad.”

Joey blew out a puff of air that smelled like morning breath and beer. “You’re my son. It’s not the first time you’ve seen my underwear. What do you want? Or did you come here to give me a hard time about how I answer the door?”

Gideon looked back at his dad, getting his first real look at the man who’d raised him since his return. The right side of his face sagged more than he’d noticed in the dim bar, and his arm hung limply at his side.

“I spoke to Noah,” Gideon said.

“Oh yeah? Good for you.”

“From what he said, it sounded like you’d completely recovered.”

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