Chapter Twenty-Six
“Let’s make a pit stop at my place,” Freya says as she pulls away from Moodey Lumber. “We’ll pick up Ginger and head to a spot where we can think.”
Back in downtown Hero, Freya rolls her truck by the police station, where two news reporters linger.
I swear she slows to give them enough time to recognize her.
One of the reporters actually gives chase.
Freya guns the engine, skirts the harbor, and skids into the garage beneath the condo complex.
“The trick with reporters is to escape without killing anyone,” she says, her eyes sparkling.
“We’re lucky they aren’t paparazzi. Those guys never give up. ”
I wonder if she welcomes the renewed attention. “You can spin a reboot of Scene of the Crime out of this mess,” I say as we get out of the truck. “They can base the script on what’s happening right now. And if you play Gina Shock, who will play Freya Faith?”
“How meta. But I think I’ll pass.”
“You love it,” I say as she enters the code into the security system and the steel door unlocks.
“Not as much as you might believe,” Freya says.
A moment later, the elevator door opens on the condo, where Ginger waits for us, her head cocked, her ears alert. I like to think the dog remembers me, and when Freya gives permission, she comes right to my side, tail wagging. I crouch beside her and stroke her thick coat.
“Take your time with her,” Freya says as she runs upstairs.
I fall on my back and let Ginger walk across my chest and lap at my salty cheeks.
“Need anything?” Freya asks a moment later.
“Bathroom,” I say, dashing up the stairs.
Back in the truck, Ginger rests her snout on my seat and sighs as Freya heads away from town.
“What made you come to the station that day Gilcrest was interrogating me?” I ask. “I’m surprised he didn’t arrest me.”
“He doesn’t have anything on you,” Freya says.
“I was at the scene of the crime,” I say. “And I’d been running around town claiming my long-missing-and-presumed-dead father appeared out of nowhere on the night of the fire like someone trying to establish an alternative theory for a crime.”
“But what’s your motive?” Freya asks.
That one’s not hard to come up with. “Money,” I say. “I inherited an expensive piece of property. And half a construction firm.”
“As motives go, it’s not terrible,” Freya says. “But if Duncan had any evidence, you’d be in jail. He was trying to scare you, and I think it had more to do with me and Duncan’s jealousy than you. I was saving you from yourselves.”
“Unlike Seton,” I say. “She sat in her office and let Gilcrest grill me.”
Freya careens along Lake Avenue and turns up the rutted road, past Burkehaven Farm, to the trailhead at the end of Paul’s property. “You should have more faith in your girlfriend,” she says.
She cuts the engine, steps out of the truck, and opens the back. Ginger leaps after her and sits at attention before Freya releases her to run into the trees.
“Seton?” I say, struggling with my seat belt, then tripping as I alight from the truck. “She chose her job over friendship.”
“Be more than a pretty face, Harold,” Freya says. “Put two and two together. I showed up at the police station because I heard you were on the verge of making a mess for yourself, and Duncan was being a competitive prick.”
I remember the phone call with Seton on my way to the police station, how she told me to keep my mouth shut. “Seton called you,” I say.
“I’m not confirming a thing,” Freya says.
“In my day, a cop would get fired for that. Also, you need a lawyer. A criminal lawyer. Until we find one, I’ll play the role.
I was a defense attorney in a Lifetime movie about twenty years ago, and if I know one thing, it’s that a good lawyer can make the difference between life in prison and a sweet plea deal. ”
That pit in my stomach returns. I’m not sure what Freya can do if Duncan Gilcrest sets his sights on me.
She opens the truck’s covered bed, where a pair of rifles sits in a gun rack.
“You told me you had a gun in the truck,” I say. “I didn’t take you for the home-arsenal type.”
“Two is hardly an arsenal, and our relationship isn’t that old. Let’s hope we can surprise each other. Please don’t tell me you’ve never shot a rifle. It’s a good skill to have, especially if you need to protect yourself.”
I’ve never seen a gun except on a cop. Or on TV. And when Freya pulled a handgun from her safe the morning I woke next to her. She unlocks the rack, lifts one of the rifles to her shoulder, and looks through the lens. “I learned to shoot on the show. Unlike those guns, these have live ammo.”
She tosses the second rifle to me, as if we’re in an action movie. I jump away, and it clatters across the gravel road.
“It’s not loaded,” Freya says. “Yet. And here, take these.” This time, she tosses me a bag of dog treats. “You can bribe Ginger into being friends.”
Freya perches on the back of the truck and swaps her heels for a pair of hiking boots. She hefts a backpack over her shoulders. At the trailhead, she pauses and asks, “Are you coming, Harold?” then disappears into the trees, with Ginger dashing after her.
Despite my reservations, I slip the dog treats into my coat pocket and grab the second rifle from where it lies on the ground.
I hold it out in front of me, cautiously balanced between my thumbs and index fingers, and follow Freya along the brook and up the familiar trail.
At the summit, we reach the clearing studded with wooden posts and surrounded by an overgrown stone wall.
“We shot BB guns here when I was a kid,” Freya says.
“Target practice should help you reset.”
She jogs into the clearing with the backpack and places aluminum cans on top of five posts across the field. When she returns, she lights a cigarette and hands me a pair of noise-canceling headphones. “I’ll walk you through the steps,” she says. “Don’t worry. I won’t let you kill anyone.”
For the next few moments, she demonstrates holding the rifle against her shoulder and finding the target through the lens, while the cigarette dangles from the side of her mouth.
“Are you ready for ammo?” Freya asks.
“No.”
“Too bad,” she says, stubbing the cigarette out.
She spills open a paper box of long copper-colored ammunition, each of the bullets seeming large enough to take out a battleship.
She also attaches a cord to Ginger’s collar and fastens it to a hook on a gate.
“Even the best-trained dog in the world can get spooked.” She breaks open the rifle and loads the chamber.
“These are single-shot. You load one bullet at a time, pull back the hammer to release the safety, and it’s ready to fire. ”
She puts an eye to the sight, and the rifle kicks back as she squeezes the trigger. Even with the headphones, the blast reverberates through the trees. Down the field, one of the aluminum cans no longer sits atop its post.
“Nice shot,” I say.
“With this equipment, you have to be pretty shaky to miss.”
She loads my rifle and holds it toward me.
I contemplate the firearm before carefully taking it.
It feels heavy and dangerous now, as if it might explode at any moment.
“Don’t be so nervous,” Freya says, leading me to the stone wall and guiding my hands to the hammer.
“Find the target in the lens.” Her breath feels warm against my neck, and even though I don’t expect anything to happen between us, being this close to her gives me goose bumps.
“And when you’re ready, squeeze the trigger. No more.”
She moves away. I find the closest aluminum can through the lens and squeeze the trigger.
But I don’t squeeze. I pull, and the kick knocks me over into the grass, and Ginger starts to bark, and Freya has her hands over her face, and I panic that I somehow shot her until I realize she’s laughing, and the aluminum can is exactly where it was before.
I rip the headphones from my ears. “That was awesome!”
Freya removes the spent casing, loads the rifle, and stands behind me again.
This time, I’m gentler with the trigger and more prepared for the kick. I miss the target, but at least I don’t sprawl across the ground.
“We’ll make a rifleman out of you before the end of the day,” Freya says.
Ever since Gilcrest told me my mother had died, I’ve felt numb, helpless, unable to process the death or any of its aftermath.
Maybe I’ve felt that way my entire life, as I’ve tried to understand events from my childhood I can’t remember and yet shape my whole existence.
Now I don’t know if it’s that Freya cared enough to come find me, or that I found out about my mother’s secret love, or that Seton risked her career to keep me from incriminating myself, or simply that I’m getting off on firing a rifle, but something in me has awoken.
I want the truth, the entire truth, about my father, about my mother’s death—all of it.
And I want to tell my story.
I lay my phone on the stone wall. “Do you mind if I record our conversation?” I ask.
Freya takes a moment to answer. “You’re back,” she says.
“I’m back,” I say.
“Thanks for asking this time. Go ahead.”
I hit record and mark the time and location. “Your boyfriend accused me of killing my mother,” I say.
“Duncan’s not my boyfriend.”
“Do you spend most nights together?”
“Except when I’m pissed off at him.”
“Then I know two things for sure: Duncan Gilcrest is your boyfriend, and I didn’t kill my mother, no matter what he believes.”
Freya loads the chamber and fires off a round. Another aluminum can flies off its post. “Let’s figure out who did,” she says.
“How?” I ask.
“Examine the evidence: motive, means, and opportunity. That’s where Gina Shock would start. We’ll divide and conquer. Tomorrow, I’ll swing by Hadley’s place to see what she can tell me. It’ll be good to catch up with an old friend.”
“And I’ll start with Andrea Haviland,” I say. “I’ve barely seen her since she got out of the hospital.”
Mrs. Haviland took her boat to Burkehaven for a reason that morning, and it’s time to find out why.
We leave the shooting range and return to Freya’s truck, where I say goodbye before walking the rest of the way to Idlewood. There, Reid swims across the cove, while Hadley and Paul sit on the Adirondack chairs drinking gin and tonics.
“Where have you been?” Paul asks.
“Out and about,” I say.
“It’s good to have you here,” Hadley says.
When Reid finishes his swim, we make our way up to the house and turn on music while we cook dinner as if nothing’s changed, even if everything has.
Tonight Hadley’s in charge, and she’s concocted a complicated Afghani dish of pumpkin and homemade pasta that keeps us busy as the sun sets and darkness descends.
After dinner, we play Hearts on the back porch.
Later, Hadley and Paul head into the night toward their respective homes.
As I lay in bed, I wonder what secrets they reveal on their walk.
Soon Reid slips out of the house and drives away, like he did the night before the fire.
Everyone’s a suspect until eliminated.
That’s what Gilcrest said to me while I lay under my car the day before my mother’s memorial service.
Paul. Reid. Hadley. Any of them could have murdered my mother.
I’ll find out who committed the crime. I’ll ask the questions that need to be asked.
I’ll find the truth and tell my mother’s story. No matter the consequences.
When I wake in the morning, I change into my running gear and head into the hills. It’s not until I’ve passed the shooting range and reached the summit overlooking the lake that I realize I slept without dreaming.