Gideon walked around several different groups, still looking for Clara or Outlaw. He passed a few teenagers, one of them Violet. Violet did a double take, said something to her friends and darted out of the group.

“Gideon!” Violet squealed and grabbed his arm. She steadied his plate and then blinked. “Why do you have the Clarks’ baby?”

“Esme handed him to me,” Gideon said.

Violet reached out and tickled the baby under the chin. “Can I ride in your auto?”

Gideon looked at her. “Why?” he asked drawing out the word.

“Because,” she said and fluttered her eyelashes.

Gideon raised an eyebrow. That wasn’t enough and she was fourteen.

“It’s a sweet looking auto and I want to ride in it.” Violet widened her eyes. It would have worked better if she hadn’t been wearing heavy amounts of eye make-up.

Gideon raised the other eyebrow. “Uh huh.”

“Does it go fast? Is it loud? Do you have a good sound system? Have you ever won any races?”

“It’s an auto,” Gideon said. “There’s nothing special about it.”

“But, but, it’s a sweet looking auto!”

“I’m not sure what that means,” Gideon told her.

“Can I please have a ride in it?” Violet pouted.

“Oh for,” Gideon sighed. “Where’s Savannah?”

“Umm,” Violet bit her lip and spun about on her toes. “That way,” she said. She pointed.

“I don’t want to know how you know that.”

“I see Frankie. She’s usually with Frankie,” Violet said.

Gideon nodded. “Right.” He headed in that direction. “Who is Christie friends with?” he asked.

“Brier.”

Gideon winced.

“She’s one of the nice ones though,” Violet said. “They were both cheerleaders, or Savannah says.” Violet paused. “Corey!” she shouted and then departed off into the crowd.

Gideon had a direction and he could see Frankie for himself now. He didn’t know if Corey was a girl or a guy. Names, gendered names, they would greatly help lessen his confusion. One of the men turned around.

“Gideon!” he said and held out a hand. “I’m Knox. Town Council.”

Gideon looked at the baby, his plate and then Knox. “Nice to meet you,” he said.

Knox laughed and dropped his hand. “Sorry, reflex. You look like you’ve got your hands full. I dropped by your place earlier today and you were out.”

“The Clarks—”

“Need their roof done.” Knox shook his head. “I’m putting pressure on the realtors. They know better than to pull shit like that in this town.” He reached out and tickled the baby under the chin. “How did you like the basket?”

“It confuses me,” Gideon said. “Do you give something like that to all newcomers?”

“If they buy a house, or rent. Not the college pups, the college pups get their own welcome kit from the university and it’s not nearly as nice as ours.”

Gideon nodded. “That, um—”

“Is a relief?”

Gideon shrugged. “Being singled out—”

Knox seemed good at interrupting and figuring out Gideon’s feelings. “Makes you uncomfortable when we want you to feel comfortable,” Knox sighed. “I would have brought it over to the Clarks, but you’d have lost half the good stuff before you had a chance to try it.”

Gideon half-grinned. “Yeah. I can see that.” He shifted on his feet. “Does Lollytarts always give lollipops?”

Knox’s face crinkled up. “Gideon, you’ve been there six times in three weeks. They noticed.”

Gideon flushed. “Right. On that note,” he muttered. “Thanks, it’ll be useful. I do need to find Savannah.”

Knox reached out and shook the baby’s hand. “You’re welcome. I’m sure we’ll be able to talk again and if you have any questions about Jasper, I’ll be glad to answer them.”

Gideon paused. “Are those all the laws?”

“Yep. Jasper laws, federal laws are different. But if Colorado wants to enforce their laws here in Jasper, they’ll have to come and do it themselves. Otherwise…” Knox shrugged. “We figure our laws trump theirs.”

“Right.” Gideon tried not to sound faint. His understanding was that federal laws were supposed to trump town laws but if Jasper did it backwards, who was he to protest? He nodded at Knox. “Be seeing you,” he said and walked towards Frankie.

As promised, Savannah was next to Frankie and the girls were giggling over something. There was a small table nearby. Gideon sighed and put his plate on it. “Um, Savannah?” he said.

Savannah turned and smiled at him. “Having fun?”

He opened his mouth, and then snapped it shut. He reached over, grabbed one of the cookies and shoved it into his mouth. That question was a trap.

Savannah raised an eyebrow at him. Frankie slapped a hand over her eyes.

Gideon swallowed the cookie. “Violet wants a ride in my auto,” he said.

“She mentioned something along those lines yesterday.” Savannah’s sweet voice dropped into a lower range.

Gideon flashed her a panicked look. “You couldn’t warn me?” he asked and then grabbed another cookie. “Is there someone I should be getting permission from or am I going with a polite but firm ‘no?’” he asked and took a bite of the cookie. He wasn’t entirely sure he was staying yet, but regardless, he could give Violet a ride in his auto if she wanted one.

Savannah’s eyes lit up and she smiled at him. “Her aunt and uncle are here at the party. They’re friends of the Club, and they’d be the ones to get permission from.”

Gideon swallowed again. “Not her parents?”

Savannah shook her head and sighed. “Violet’s an orphan.”

Gideon looked at the cookie. “Oh.”

“We rescued her like we did Dr. Brown and now she’s our little mascot,” Frankie said.

Gideon nodded and fiddled with the cookie and then decided the best thing to do was finish it. He ate it and swallowed. “If she does get permission, would you ride with us, Savannah? I, um, don’t take this wrong, but I don’t want anyone to get the wrong ideas.”

Savannah beamed at him. “Of course I will.” She went up on tiptoes and kissed his cheek. Then she leaned over and kissed the baby’s forehead. “How did you end up with him?” she asked.

“Esme,” Gideon said. He shifted the baby. “Would you?”

“I don’t think so,” Savannah said and laughed. “Outlaw is with Flint and Marion.”

Gideon inhaled. “And they would be where?”

“Near the grills.”

“Oh thank God,” Gideon murmured. “You made the cookies?”

“I did,” Savannah wrinkled her nose.

“They were good. I’ll, yeah.” Gideon grabbed his plate. “Thanks!” he said and turned around and headed towards the grills.

Frankie and Savannah laughed at his back. The back of his neck flushed but he didn’t mind. He walked around a few groups of people talking, nodding at those who saw them but not stopping to talk.

“You like babies?” a girl said.

Gideon jumped and turned to look and found himself surrounded by females. He started to sweat. Oh hell. He didn’t know any of these girls. And their make-up reminded him of the way Ashley wore hers. There were several brunettes and a blonde. Each of them were wearing a different colored dress under their kutte. He looked behind him. He took a step back from them. “I’m looking for Outlaw,” he said.

One shifted her weight to one hip, she put a hand on it. “That doesn’t answer the question.” She wore a dress of dark burgundy that was almost black.

“Sorry, Miss, I’ve known you less than thirty seconds,” he said. Whether or not he liked babies was none of their business, and he wasn’t about to spread that bit of information around.

“Of course you don’t know us, Savannah has been keeping you all to herself,” the same girl said and pushed on her hair with the base of her hand, looking for all the world like she was fluffing it. She lowered her eyelashes at Gideon.

Gideon shifted again wishing he had a hand free. He swore that was the second or third time that he’d heard Savannah was hoarding him to herself. His eyes narrowed. As far as he could tell, Savannah wasn’t like that. She’d left him to his own devices whenever they weren’t running errands or working on the roof. Plus, she was sponsoring him into the Club. It was logical they’d spend a lot of time together.

If these girls didn’t have enough courage to approach him when Savannah was around, that was their problem and not his.

“And Hunter is a good guard dog for when she’s not with you,” another girl said. Her dress was teal and coral.

“Helping Hunter is my job,” Gideon growled. He was going to get Hunter a cake and thank her profusely. Calling her a guard dog was insulting, however if she was protecting him from this female nonsense, Hunter deserved compensation.

The three girls looked at each other and through the silent communication that Gideon swore females had, they seemed to agree it was time to change their approach. Gideon didn’t give a damn about their approach. If he wanted to be friends with them, he would approach them.

“Summer is coming up,” the first girl in the burgundy dress said. “There is a lot more entertainment in the summer. There are great bands playing in the park.”

“And the downtown theatre is putting on a famous Broadway play in a few weeks,” a new one said, she was blonde and in a red dress that perfectly matched her lipstick.

“Since you’re new to Jasper, we weren’t sure if you knew about them or not,” said the girl in the teal and coral dress. “Some of them are really good. And there’s Founder’s Days too.”

The implication was clear. He should go to these events with them, whether he wanted to go to them or not.

Gideon looked between them. “I’ve been to Broadway,” he said. He’d been stationed near enough to the City that it wasn’t difficult to go into the City whenever he wanted as long as he had leave.

One of the girls, the blonde, lit up. “You have!”

“To see the Rockettes,” he said. “Does Jasper have Rockettes?” he asked. Oh, he’d seen more than the City Rockettes on Broadway, but the Rockettes were all females who wore skimpy outfits and kicked their legs high into the air. He wasn’t above being petty and stereotypically male if it got these girls off his case.

The girls looked at each other in confusion.

He hadn’t thought so. He jiggled the baby. “I need to get the baby back to Outlaw. Excuse me,” he said and dodged between them while he had a chance.

The blonde turned on her toes. “Wait! We haven’t told you our names,” she said and dashed after him. “And I want to hear about Broadway.”

Gideon was better at this than she was. He dodged through a couple of groups and disappeared. He made it over to the grills and found Outlaw with two other men, one he recognized as Flint and the other had short graying hair. Gideon didn’t want to assume this was Marion. He approached them. “Hey, Outlaw, I have someone who belongs to you.”

Outlaw turned and his face lit up. He reached out and grabbed his baby. “Hello precious,” he said. And then seemed to remember his dignity. “Hello, Gideon,” he said.

“I’m glad I’m not precious,” Gideon said with a straight face. He shook his arm and let his shoulders relax.

Flint laughed.

Gideon nodded at him. “Flint.”

The other man stuck his hand out. “Marion,” he said.

Gideon reached out and shook it. “Gideon. Good to meet you, sir.”

Marion’s eyebrows flew up.

Flint choked. “Be careful, Gideon.”

Gideon let Marion’s hand go.

Outlaw grinned. “Marion likes practical jokes. Call him sir one too many times and you might end up on the receiving end.”

“I’ll keep my guard up,” Gideon said. “If you can make allowances for a deeply ingrained military habit.”

“Military?” Marion said. “Have you been anywhere interesting?”

“If I told you, I’d have to kill you.” Gideon shifted on his feet and then raised an eyebrow at Marion. “I was Special Forces, most of my assignments are Classified with a capital-C and according to my commanders, if anybody knew what we did out there, we’d failed.”

“A good explanation as any.”

“I didn’t fail.” Gideon shrugged. He went after the food on his plate. “The other parts of my assignments were boring.”

Flint chuckled again. “Months of waiting for thirty seconds of excitement.”

“No joke.” Gideon sighed. “Or endless miles of slogging through god forsaken jungle without a clear reason to why we were there in the first place. It toughens you up.” Gideon straightened into a correct posture and changed his expression. “Or do you want to be a ninety pound shaved ape forever, Private!” He relaxed and rolled his eyes. “I had a hard time keeping the fact I wasn’t an ape behind my teeth. The guy had a heart of mush but he had the skin of those wild roses.” Gideon shuddered.

Wild roses had more thorns than domesticated roses and grew on vines that took over everything. He’d gotten caught in one once as a literal pup. His grandfather had cut him out, laughed at him but allowed him a good cuddle once he’d been out of the vines. Gideon supposed it was the same as the porcupine lesson. He wouldn’t have believed his grandfather unless he’d run into it himself. His grandfather had been gentle both times, amused, but gentle.

Marion grinned. “Too bad you can’t tell the real stories.”

“Be too much like bragging,” Gideon replied. He picked up one of the cupcakes, the lemon one he thought, unwrapped it and took a bite. He chewed, swallowed, and glared at it.

“Something wrong?”

He looked at Flint. “It doesn’t taste as good as the first one she gave me.”

Marion choked.

“I’m not going to put in a neat little box by Flossie,” Gideon grumbled. “Especially if it is Savannah’s favorite.”

Outlaw laughed.

Gideon finished the first cupcake, nodded at them, and headed off towards the drinks table. He needed coffee now.

Violet popped up in front of him.

Gideon jumped. “Jesus!”

“What did Savannah say?” Violet jumped up and down. “May I? May I? May I?”

“You may lay off the sugar,” Gideon muttered and walked around her. He reached for a mug and the coffee pot.

“Gideon!” Violet pouted.

Gideon poured himself a cup of coffee. “You need to ask your aunt and uncle,” he said.

“Okay,” Violet said.

Gideon grabbed her arm before she could take off running as it looked like she was about to do. “And if they give permission, Savannah will be riding with us. You will be in the back.”

Violet bit her lip.

“This is non-negotiable, Violet,” Gideon said. He had younger siblings. He knew how this worked.

Violet nodded. Seeing she understood, Gideon let her go. She took off at a run through the party. Gideon, sighed, rolled his eyes, and jerked his chin upwards. Teenage girls. He grabbed his coffee and took a sip.

“Oh, she looks excited,” an unfamiliar female voice, said at his elbow. “What has her excited?”

Gideon almost spit the swallow out. Though it wasn’t teenage females he was having problems with right now. He swallowed the coffee and went after the next cupcake leaving the chocolate one that Flossie had declared his favorite for last.

“She’s fourteen,” he hedged. “Lots of things get fourteen-year-old girls excited.” He looked at the girl and blew out a breath through his nose, another cheerleader type, complete with a cardigan sweater and God help him, pearls. “Let me guess, you’re a friend of Brier.”

She beamed at him. “I am! I’m Bridget.”

Gideon took a bite of his cupcake and nodded.

“Bridget!” another girl called and ran up to them. She turned to Gideon. “I’m Kit,” she said with a smile. “Savannah has told me about you.” Her brunette hair had obvious highlights in it.

Gideon raised an eyebrow. “Do I want to know?” he asked under his breath.

“I’m a massage therapist and stylist,” Kit said. “Savannah is a client, anything she tells me though is top secret.” She put a finger to her lips and winked at him.

Bridget frowned at Kit. “I was about to invite Gideon to church.”

Gideon backed away. He already had a church.

Kit put a hand on Bridget’s arm and frowned at her, digging her nails in. “I’d think he’d want to go with Savannah to church. She is sponsoring him after all.”

“Oh don’t be silly,” Bridget said. “You don’t have to go to church with your sponsor. That’s not a rule.”

Kit’s brow furrowed. “I know it’s not a rule.”

Gideon took another step back. “Um, ladies, I’m going to Padre’s church,” he said.

“See,” Kit said. “Where Savannah goes.”

“There are other churches that you should try before settling on Padre’s,” Bridget said with a smile.

Why were all these females being pushy? Gideon wanted to scream. He inhaled and got a large dose of flowery perfume and he couldn’t tell if it was from Kit or Bridget. He struggled not to gag. “I relate to Padre’s stories.”

Kit nodded. “I figured as much.”

Bridget bit her lip.

Violet grabbed Gideon’s arm again. She beamed at him. “As long as Savannah rides with us and you don’t drive too fast or when it’s rainy, my aunt and uncle say we can.” Violet let him go to hug him about the shoulders and kiss his cheek. “Thank you, thank you, thank you!”

Gideon sighed and patted her hand. “We’ll discuss with your aunt and uncle a good time later.”

Violet squealed. “I’m going to go sketch your auto now!” she said, kissed his cheek again and took off.

Gideon rubbed his cheek against his shoulder. “Isn’t it a bit dark for that?” he muttered.

He turned back to Bridget and Kit to hear the tail end of a hissed, “What are you doing?” from Bridget directed at Kit.

He looked between them and decided it was time to make his escape and quickly. He smiled at them, nodded. “Excuse me. Teenager, auto, you know,” he said and walked away. He exhaled a few feet away.

Eberron came up and put an arm around his shoulders.

Gideon jumped and looked over at him. “Oh, you.”

“Me, Prospect?”

Gideon whimpered.

Eberron grinned. He’d been watching, betting upon, and laughing as Gideon had escaped female after female. However, the poor boy looked like he’d reached his limit. “You want to go to a spot where there are no women?” he asked.

“Such a place exists?” Gideon asked.

“Yeah, it’s called,” Eberron raised a hand and made air quotes, “not here.”

Gideon looked around and lowered his voice. “We can leave?” he asked.

“We sneak out quietly.”

“I’ve got an auto, and it’s noticeable.”

“Quietly,” Eberron insisted. “We’re going to the diner if you want to come.”

“And what about Savannah?”

“It’s debatable if she’s still here.” Eberron shrugged. “We’re going, Prospect.”

Gideon looked down at his plate. “Let me get rid of this.”

“We’ll meet you by your auto.”

“Shoo Violet away from it,” Gideon said.

Eberron chuckled and the two separated.

Gideon found that by walking quickly and nodding that no one stopped him. He finished his coffee, set the mug into one of the dish pans, grabbed the last two cupcakes and put the plate in there too. Looking at the cupcakes, it reminded him of what he’d promised himself he’d do for Hunter. He sidled over to the dessert table and grabbed another of the chocolate. He swore he’d passed Hunter in between one of the many groups.

There were too many scents to track her down that way, he used his memory of whom Hunter had been nearby to find her. Gideon came up behind her, took a step to the side and put the cupcake in front of her nose.

She blinked at it and turned her head to look at him.

He wiggled it back and forth.

Hunter raised an eyebrow, reached up and took it. Gideon leaned in, bussed her cheek, “Thank you for being grumpy,” he murmured in her ear, and took off before she could say anything.

Hunter’s mouth opened, she turned to say something, but Gideon was long gone. Her brow furrowed. No one in her memory had ever thanked her for being grumpy before. She looked at the cupcake and started to unwrap it. She didn’t know what Gideon was going on about, but she wasn’t going to refuse cake.

Gideon made it to his auto without any other incidents and he, Eberron, and several of the other men managed to head out. They weren’t the only ones leaving. They blended in with them. Gideon wasn’t sure why the others were leaving. He didn’t care, as long as no one noticed he had.

He didn’t breathe deeply until the gates were behind them and they were driving away.

---

Gideon sat down at the diner table and reacquainted himself with the others by shaking hands and getting names again. He’d finished the cupcakes on the way over and was now in desperate need of water and more coffee. He slumped into the seat. “Is it me or are there more girls than guys?” he asked of the tabletop.

Eberron kept his face straight. “There are more girls than guys.”

Gideon grimaced. “Why is that?”

“You’d think with statistics,” Eberron leaned forward.

Gideon sensed a dissertation coming on. “Not a serious question,” he interrupted.

“They just do,” Eberron changed his answer.

The others laughed. Gideon half smiled and rubbed his forehead. He leaned back into the seat and determined to get to know those his age better and not think about girls for a while.