Chapter Seventeen #2
“I think I might possibly have the beginning of a potential relationship.”
Gideon got home just as Joe started cooking breakfast.
“I take it you and Arden shelved a lot of books last night.”
“My grandfather’s a hell of a smart-ass.”
“Proud of it. She feed you?”
Gideon got himself another cup of coffee. “She does smoothies. This one was purple. She puts seeds in it.”
“Well, looks like you’ll just have to settle for bacon and eggs.”
“Thank God.”
“Are you going to see her again?”
“I’m going to pick up a pizza and go over in a couple days.”
“I’m glad to hear it. I like that girl, Gideon.”
“It turns out I do, too.”
They had a companionable breakfast, with the dog dozing under the table and the rain falling as if it had a score to settle. Joe sat back with coffee while Gideon dealt with the dishes.
“Weatherman says this’ll keep up until midday tomorrow.”
Gideon nodded. “I’ll bring in some more firewood.”
“That’ll be good. Is Arden set there? She’s got a wood-burning.”
“I don’t know. I’ll check. Look, Pop, I jumped in, but I’m just treading water right now. She’s got something in there. It makes her skittish when she doesn’t want to be.”
“You could ask her.”
He couldn’t claim not his business, not honestly, now. But.
“We’ll see if and when she trusts me enough to tell me.”
“All right then.” Joe rose. “I’ll see you later this afternoon when you come in.”
“I can take the morning if you want to stay home awhile.”
“Nah, you go on, work on those bookcases. I’ve got some paperwork to see to before we open.”
“I’m going to turn a bowl first. It’s been nagging at me.”
“Then Elvis and I’ll see you later.”
Alone, Gideon set the kitchen to rights. He went up for a quick shower, and who could blame a man for remembering the one he’d taken late at night when he’d had company in the steam and the spray?
But he had things to do, so set that memory aside and went out through the wet to the shop.
Lights, the morning’s music. He’d already selected the wood, made his cardboard template. He put on his safety goggles, his thick leather gloves, chose his band saw blade, made his adjustments.
With his template circle in place, he turned on the saw, brought it up to speed. Sure and cautious, he fed the left edge of the wood blank and followed the edge of the cardboard.
He kept his eye on the awl he used to hold the template in place, rotated the wood until he had that perfect circle.
With his music and the rain banging, he chose the faceplate for the lathe.
At the lathe, he unlocked the headstock as his grandfather had taught him long ago. Rotate the headstock, he heard Pop tell him, not the wood, and as he used the handwheel, he felt the threads turning smooth.
While he worked, with the sound of rain, music, machine, with the scent of sawdust, his mind focused on the steps, on the wood, on the shape he wanted to create.
Any outside worries, concerns, questions just slipped away with the feel of the wood.
He measured the blank, marked it, then drilled holes in the center for the faceplate.
Time passed, and he relaxed into it. He cleared away some of the bark area, creating the flat area he needed before attaching the faceplate, checked, approved.
He’d always thought of it as him and the lathe working together, rather than simply man and machine.
He spent an hour, then two. Stopped long enough to decide between coffee and a cold drink. He went with a Coke and, drinking it, studied his progress.
If he didn’t screw up from here, he thought it would turn into a damn fine-looking bowl. Good-sized salad bowl. He’d make the smaller ones another time.
He began to shape the bottom of the bowl, creating another flat area, tailstock end wide enough for the four-jaw chuck and the tendon shoulder.
It took patience, but he always found that here. As the tendon changed shape, he had to stop, true it, tighten the jaws when necessary.
Step by step, minute by minute, tool by tool until it came time to start removing the wood up to the tendon line.
He’d had more than one bowl go flying at this point in his pursuit of this craft.
He checked the time, calculated he had enough.
With the lathe turning, he used the spindle gouge to mark the bowl’s center. After stopping the lathe, he used foam padding to protect the wood surface, then started the lathe again, slow speed. And saw, satisfied, it turned true.
He had enough time to sand the interior, then clean up, and grab something to eat before he headed into town.
When he finally stepped out of the shop, he saw Tom Franklin, Riverbend’s chief of police, crossing the yard.
“Hi there, Gideon.”
“Chief. Do I have to go bail Pop out?”
Tom, a genial sort who could turn hard-ass on a dime if and when called for, chuckled.
Though closer to his father’s age than his grandfather’s, Gideon knew Tom and Joe had been friends for decades.
“Good thing you’re around to keep him out of trouble. I just came from the store. Joe said you’d probably be back in the shop.”
“Yeah, working on something. I’ve got some time before I have to head in, keep my eye on the man. Want coffee?”
“Wouldn’t mind a dry spot and a cup, thanks.”
Tom, stocky, keen-eyed, a short bush of hair gone Brillo-pad gray, stepped into the kitchen and took off the dung-brown Stetson he’d worn for two decades.
“Had some half-wit tourist driving like it’s a speedway on a sunny day in May. Ended up in a ditch. He’s fine, and so’s the nitwit with him. But his Porsche’s never going to be the same.”
“Some people lose half their driving IQs at the first drop of rain.”
“That’s God’s truth.”
Since Tom often frequented the kitchen, Gideon knew the chief took his coffee as strong and black as he did. He handed Tom a mug.
“Thanks. I’m going to sit a minute if you don’t mind. I won’t keep you long.”
“It’s okay. I’ve got some time.” Gideon took his own seat at the kitchen table.
“Well, you might’ve heard I had a little health incident a couple weeks back.”
“I did, but Joe said you came out fine. You look fine.”
“That’s what I say. Gave me aspirin, got me on blood thinners.
” Now he rolled his eyes. “Treatment plan with health foods, exercise. Want me to lose ten pounds, and I guess it wouldn’t hurt.
As far as heart attacks go, it didn’t amount to much.
They even call what I had a mini, for fuck’s sake. Mini.”
Shaking his head, he drank coffee.
“But that hasn’t stopped Sherry from worrying herself into a frenzy, and nagging me to do yoga.”
“Yoga?” Gideon grinned at the image. “Namaste.”
Tom answered Gideon’s grin. “She signed me up for it at the gym, and with a personal trainer. And she bought some heart-healthy cookbook.”
“The woman loves you, Tom.”
“She must to tolerate my ways for thirty-seven years. And I love her back and then some. It’s got the kids worrying, too. TJ came down from Seattle, Greg’s joined the gym as my—get this—accountability partner, and Angie buys me this tracker watch.”
He tapped the watch on his wrist. “Steps, calories, sleep, and my fucking heart rate, BP, and who the fuck can figure half of it out anyway?”
“Looks like your kids love you, too.”
“I’m grateful for it. Grateful to have a wife and grown-ass kids, grandkids who love me.
The thing is, besides the damn yoga, eating better, and all that, I’m supposed to cut back on stress.
Hard to do with the family worried. Hard when half-wit tourists end up in ditches.
Drunks trade punches until somebody’s in the ER, series of break-ins, somebody beats his wife for the third time, or she grabs a gun and shoots him. ”
Tom shrugged. “Six thousand, eight hundred, and forty-six souls in Riverbend last count. I’ve got twelve good officers and a hell of an operations manager, but I’m in charge.”
“Are you thinking of retiring, Tom?”
“Not thinking, that part’s done. I’m doing it.
” Tom puffed out his cheeks, blew the air out audibly.
“I’ve been chief for twenty-four years, and on Riverbend’s force for ten more.
That’s a long time to protect and serve, longer than you’ve been alive.
And I need to give this to Sherry, to my family. ”
“You’re a good cop. Always have been.”
“I am, and I have been, and it’s time for someone else to step in, step up. I’m asking you to do that, Gideon.”
The man had laid it all out, Gideon realized, and still he hadn’t seen it coming.
“Me? Jesus, Tom. You’ve got Hawk or—”
“I talked to Hawk, and we both knew going into that talk this isn’t for him. He’s a damn good sergeant, but he doesn’t want chief and he’s not wired for it either. None of them are. Kim comes closest. You know Kim Chung?”
“A little, yeah.”
“Well, she’s a damn good cop, but she needs another ten years under her belt before she’d make a good chief. And I don’t want handing it over to an outsider.”
“I’m an outsider.”
Now Tom scowled, and a trace of the hard-ass came with it. “Fuck you are. You’re a Riley. You were ten years a cop in LA, a detective, Major Crimes.”
“And you know how that ended up.”
“I do.” Those sharp eyes looked hard into Gideon’s.
“You did what was right. You stood up for what the badge is meant to stand for. You got the shaft, but you stood up. I had one condition when I said I’d retire.
I needed to turn this responsibility and this privilege over to someone I respected, and trusted.
A good, honest, no-bullshit cop who could lead and shoulder what needs to be shouldered.
“That’s you. I talked to the mayor, the town council.”
Gideon wasn’t easily stunned, but that one got him.
“Hold on, Tom.”
“No, you do that a minute.” Tom slapped a finger on the table.
“Hold on, and hear me out. I talked to them because I wasn’t going to come to you with this if they started quacking and huffing at the idea.
They didn’t, so if you decide to meet with them, they won’t give you any trouble.
The job’s yours if you want it. You’ll have to do the meeting, but they’re not idiots. At least not half the time.”
Tom nodded when Gideon said nothing.
“Take some time to think about it. I didn’t say anything to Joe, but I figure he’s got a pretty good idea why I wanted to talk to you. If you want to run this around with him, that’s fine and good. I’m taking four weeks to tie everything up, so think it over.”
Tom rose, stepped over to lay a hand on Gideon’s shoulder. “Riverbend would be lucky to have you, but if you decide against, no hard feelings. Think it through, let me know.”
“I will.”
“I gotta get going.” Tom picked up his Stetson, put it on. “Thanks for the coffee.”
Alone, Gideon stared into his coffee. Just like that, he thought, his life could change again.
If he let it.
He didn’t say anything about his conversation with Tom when he got to the store, even when he caught his grandfather’s questioning look.
He did the job he’d moved to Riverbend to do. Worked the register, waited on customers, answered questions, mixed paint.
At six, he helped Joe close the store.
“We’re coming in the same time tomorrow. I’ll leave my truck,” Joe said, “ride with you.”
They went out in the rain, drove the half mile to Around the Bend, where they had their monthly steak dinner.
They sat in the same booth, had the same server, ordered the same meal—New York strip, medium rare, loaded baked potato, roasted brussels sprouts, and one glass of local cabernet each.
Gideon always found the routine a comfort.
“Ready to talk about it?” Joe asked him.
“I guess I am.”
“I take it Tom’s decided to retire.”
“Yeah.”
“You’re taking the job.”
It didn’t come as a question, but a statement, so Gideon shook his head.
“I don’t know. I haven’t had time to think it through.”
“Thanks, Hailey.” Joe gave their server a smile when she brought them the wine and warm sourdough bread.
After a quick and easy conversation, Joe turned back to Gideon.
“Let me take something out of that thinking. I love you, Giddyup, and when my time comes, I’d turn the store over to you if that’s what you wanted.
You don’t, but you’d take it, run it, because you’d think it’s what I want.
It’s not, not for you. You’re no shopkeeper,” he added.
“You do fine because you’re not lazy and if you do something, you don’t do it half-assed.
You could make a decent living woodworking.
Money’s never going to be a problem for you, but you’re a man who wants and needs to make his own, and you don’t want to make it through your craft. ”
“Hobby.”
“Call it what you like. Gideon Joseph Riley, you’re a cop. It’s what you want, and always have.”
Gideon just frowned into his wine. “I turned in my badge for a reason.”
“A couple of them,” Joe agreed. “You stood up against dirty cops, exposed them for what they were. They’re the ones who didn’t deserve that badge.
You paid a price for it, and it could’ve been your life, but you did what was right.
You might’ve kept going, despite them, if we hadn’t lost your grandmother.
If you hadn’t come to make sure I got through. ”
“No, I was done, Pop.” That fact, however painful, was fact. “I was done with it.”
“Maybe so, and there’s no blame or shame there. You turned in that badge, and you never once dishonored it. I can’t look at you and find a reason you wouldn’t pick up this one.”
Joe sipped some wine. “If you need a little more incentive to do what we both know you want, what we both know you’re meant to do? You’re fired.”
Gideon let out a laugh. “Come on, Pop.”
“I’m serious. Don’t you use me to stop you from doing what you want.
I won’t let you. Who the hell knows why things happen?
People say there’s always a reason, and maybe that’s true.
But the fact is, what happened in LA happened, what happened to my Colleen happened.
What’s happening now is happening now. When it’s offered, laid right out?
Take what you want, Gideon, what you need. ”
Everything in him lifted, and what he’d closed off opened again.
“I guess I will, since I’m out of a job. I love you, Pop.”
“You’re a bright spot in my life, Giddyup. You make me proud.”