Leave a Trail (Signal Bend #7)(147)

Now, for such a big dog—Lilli said he weighed about a buck-fifty—he was old.

They went out into the yard, and Isaac marveled at the changes there. Inside, much was the same. A few pieces of furniture had been rearranged, but for the most part, the first floor looked as he remembered. The kids’ rooms upstairs were a lot different, but, then, so were the kids. He’d left a kindergartener and a preschooler and had come home to two middle-schoolers.

Outside, though, everything was different. The barn had been refurbished and now housed four horses and a pony. Lilli’s kitchen garden had tripled in size. The flower beds that she’d been developing for years were now well established and looked to be practically self-sustaining. Except for the kitchen garden, his grandmother’s rose garden, which was twice the size he’d remembered, and some decorative beds, most of what Lilli had done was native planting, and those plants flourished. The yard he’d neglected for all the years he’d lived here alone, and that his father had neglected for years before that, was a fantastic riot of color and scent.

In addition to the storage and tool sheds, and the barn, and the garage, and his woodshop—which he wasn’t ready to think about yet—there were two new outbuildings, including a treehouse, well built into a big old oak at the side of the house. That hurt Isaac a little—a lot, really—because he’d planned to build one for them but had wanted to wait until Gia was a little older. Then he’d gone away. What had been erected—by the Horde, he was sure—was a good, strong house, but his hands had not built it.

The other building was Bo’s schoolroom, a little house, painted a cheery blue with a bright red, glass-paned door and two big windows on either side. Isaac went into it now, Kodi at his heel. It was a good room, about ten by ten, the floor clean, unvarnished planks. The interior walls were drywalled and painted with chalkboard paint, on which Bo had drawn the repetitive, intricate patterns he seemed to want to draw all the time.

One wall was all shelves, cabinets, and cubbies, filled with books and supplies. Along another wall was a cheap loveseat that looked like it might fold out. A big dog bed lay on the floor at its side. A long bulletin board hung on another wall. In the middle of the room was a round, white table and four bright red plastic chairs.

He was not shocked at all to see that Lilli had gone all out. All out was pretty much her only speed.

One thing he had not needed to worry about while he was away was the family’s finances. The B&B

was doing great and had started to make a real profit as the tide for Signal Bend had really turned. The exurbs had finally spread out far enough from the Greater St. Louis Area that the people who wanted some room and some quiet but still needed to work in St. Louis, or at least St. Louis County, had been pushed out their way, facing a two-hour morning commute at best. Isaac wasn’t sure he liked that—he’d liked being remote and ignored—but it didn’t much matter how he felt about it. It was done. Signal Bend was prospering.

That meant that the B&B was prospering. And Valhalla Vin. And Tasha’s clinic. And the reestablished Signal Bend Construction. The club was still the town’s de facto police force, contracted by the business owners to maintain order. As a member of the Horde, Isaac had been pulling in his share of its profits, though it was a lesser share than he would have had as President, lesser even than he would pull in now, as an active, working member of the club. But between Lilli’s income and his, his family was secure.

Legitimate business had made them more secure, in more ways, than outlaw work ever had.

So far, the town had managed to maintain the balance between prosperity and selling out. There was no Starbucks, no McDonald’s, no Walmart. There was the IGA and Marie’s. And there were a couple of new, independently-owned restaurants and shops. A bookstore, too. He hadn’t seen any of this yet, but Lilli had kept him apprised as the changes had been happening. Reading and hearing about them and making the differences happen in his mental image of his home were two different things, though, and he felt some trepidation about going into town.

Speaking of trepidation, there was only one building he hadn’t checked out, only one place in his home.

Not entirely understanding why the thought of opening his woodshop made the acid in his stomach roil, he turned in the middle of Bo’s schoolroom, intent on climbing that hurdle.

Bo was standing in the doorway.

“Oh. Hey, little man. I didn’t hear you guys get back.” He looked around and realized that Kodi wasn’t in the room with him, either. He’d really gotten lost in his thoughts.

“I like your school. Is it okay that I’m in here?”

Bo nodded.

“Did you have fun at Uncle Show’s?” There were so many children in the family now who didn’t know him. Loki. Millie and Joey—his godchildren. Badger and Adrienne’s three little ones: Henry, Megan, and Caroline.

His own son.

Bo nodded again in answer to his question. Isaac tried something and asked a question that couldn’t be answered with a simple gesture. “What did you do?”

Bo shrugged. Well, okay. That gesture covered just about everything, he supposed.

“Hey. Have you ever been in my woodshop?” He knew the answer. No one had since the last time he’d been in it himself. For Lilli, the shop had become a sacred place, left to wait for him, unchanged.

Bo shook his head.