Chapter Twenty-Eight
The landing field in Kingston sits behind a chain-link fence right outside town, with a single hangar rising from the center of an expanse of asphalt.
I park the Volvo in a dusty lot and head toward the only aircraft present, a helicopter with a slowly spinning rotor blade, where Seton preps for a flight, exactly where Mrs. Haviland told me I would find her.
Seton works through a checklist, talking to someone in the cockpit. She laughs, sweeping a hand over her spiky hair as she jots something on the clipboard, showing a placid ease I don’t see often enough.
I call her name and wave.
“Charlie Kilgore,” she says, stepping away from the helicopter blades’ rhythmic pulsing. “My mother called to tell me you might show up.”
I hand her a sheet of yellow construction paper. “Turnabout is fair play.”
Seton unfolds the note and reads through the large font. “The unicorn stickers are a nice touch,” she says.
“I, Charles R. Kilgore,” I say, “officially apologize for making assumptions about my friend Seton Haviland’s actions. I thought she didn’t have my back, but I was wrong.”
Seton folds the paper and slides it into her pocket. “The less said about the day Gilcrest brought you to the station, the better.”
“Your secret’s safe with me,” I say, turning to leave.
Seton calls after me, “Where do you think you’re going?”
The next thing I know, I’m strapped into the back of the helicopter while Seton and her instructor, some guy named Lee with an Australian accent, chiseled features, and a sleeve of tattoos that makes Seton’s seem restrained, get ready to take off. “I don’t know about this,” I yell over the noise.
“You don’t have to shout,” Seton says, her voice coming over the headset. “And tough. Lee knows what he’s doing, and I’m getting there. Don’t you want to see the lake from the sky?”
“It’s not on my to-do list,” I say.
Seton hits one of the controls. The rotor blades speed up. Beside her, Lee mumbles about antitorque pedals, and suddenly we’re rising into the sky.
“Mind the altimeter,” Lee says.
I grip the edge of my seat and double-check that the straps are buckled as Seton arcs across the airfield.
Out the window, the foothills stretch to the horizon, and soon we’re flying over the surface of the lake to where tiny Hero sits nestled on the shore.
It would be thrilling if I weren’t so terrified.
“I can’t believe the town approved a helicopter,” I say into the headset.
“You sound like Paul Burke, complaining about taxes,” Seton says.
“And it’s not as if Hero bought the helicopter.
We share it with Kingston and a whole slew of other towns.
You’d be surprised how many day hikers get lost. Dogs, too.
My whole team was out for two days this spring looking for a missing goat. ”
“Manage your torque,” Lee says.
Seton touches another pedal. The helicopter lurches, and I grip the edge of my seat.
“Calm down, you wuss,” Seton says as we level out. “Where do you want to go?”
Down to solid ground, though I manage to say, “I’ve never seen Idlewood from the sky.”
A few moments later, we swoop over the island, the main cabin’s metal roof glimmering in the sun. The boat’s gone from the dock. “No one’s home,” Seton says, hovering over the cove.
A patchwork of water, forests, and lawns extends to the horizon.
“Give us the 360 view,” Lee says. “Use the cyclic stick.”
The helicopter starts to turn in a smooth clockwise motion until we’re facing the foothills to the west. “How much of this land does your family own?” Seton asks me.
“The island,” I say. “And everything around the cove. And the property out to the bunga . . . to the house on the street.”
“Good catch there.” Seton jerks a thumb toward the back of the helicopter. “Charlie here lives in an eight-bedroom bungalow. That’s when he’s not staying in the lake house.”
“Shut up,” I say, though it feels good to be teased.
“Invite me over anytime,” Lee says.
Seton checks a gauge on the console. “Watch out for my mother, Charlie,” she says. “She’ll be after you soon enough to put this property in conservation. She tried to convince Jane to do the same thing.”
“Reid won’t agree to that,” I say.
We leave Idlewood and pass over the cove to Burkehaven.
From up here, the burned-out house looks small, insignificant, a darkened scar nestled among the trees.
“Charlie and I hung out here when we were teenagers,” Seton says to Lee.
“We must have tossed back hundreds of cases of beer. Now I’m the one who has to break up the parties. ”
“Screwing the mood,” Lee says.
Seton punches his arm, and I swear her eyes spark with attraction as she banks to the right and swoops over the water.
“There,” she says, a moment later, moving in over a Bryant 219 anchored in a cove.
Two faces look up into the sky, and I recognize Freya and Hadley from under their sun hats, a bottle of wine between them.
Freya’s catching up with an old friend, like she told me she would yesterday. I wonder if Hadley’s told her anything new.
Seton heads inland over Burkehaven Farm, then rises to the summit of the Ridge Trail. She turns the nose of the helicopter to face the lake, hovering above the spot where I witnessed the fire begin.
“I could take us in for a landing right there by the old cabin,” she says.
“That stone shelf is narrow,” Lee says. “Practice landing on flat ground a few more times.”
“Yes, please,” I say. “Practice on flat ground.”
“Now who’s screwing the mood?” Seton says to Lee.
I lean over the seat as, in my mind, I suddenly hear Reid’s voice as he confronted Mrs. Haviland on the dock at Burkehaven. You won’t screw me.
“Take me to Rocky Nook,” I say.
We soar past the shooting range where Freya and I went yesterday, then across the lake to an undeveloped point jutting into the water.
Below us, boats have begun to drop anchor for the day, and a single house sits up on a hill, as though standing guard.
“Reid mentioned Rocky Nook and a connection to your mother,” I say. “What happened here?”
“It’s still happening,” Seton says. “Some guy from Los Angeles inherited Rocky Nook from his uncle and aunt last year. He’d never been to the lake.
He saw dollar signs and went to sell, but there’s no access.
” She points to the land rising from the lakeshore.
“That’s all conservation land. Thanks to my mother.
Reid wanted to bid on the project and was pissed off when it fell through.
So was the owner, who’s been filing lawsuits trying to find a way to develop, but nothing’s worked so far. ”
“And Reid’s been helping him,” I say.
“I wouldn’t be surprised,” Seton says.
When we set down at the landing field, I’m grateful to be back on solid ground and ready to head up into the sky all over again.
“See you next week,” Seton says to Lee as they finish closing down the helicopter.
“Or sooner,” he says, adding, “Cheers, mate,” to me.
He has to be six five, all muscle, with that sexy Australian accent. Seton doesn’t even pretend not to watch as he makes his way toward his car.
“What’s up with the two of you?” I ask.
“He’s new to the area and doesn’t know anyone. I told him to come to the Landing some night and I’d introduce him around.”
That’s not what that seemed like to me. “He’s really good-looking,” I say.
“Believe me, he’s well aware. And he’s old enough to be my father . . . or my much older brother. I’ll pass, thank you.”
“The two of you could get matching tattoos—”
“Cut it out,” Seton says. “Those Certificates of Apology only last so long. Besides, I hear you spent yesterday with a certain TV star. Are you two a thing again?”
“We never were a thing,” I say as we move toward our cars.
“Probably for the best,” Seton says. “Gilcrest is obsessed with her. He calls her his second chance, but he’s convinced Freya’s about to hightail it back to New York and is in Panicsville.
” She tosses her bag into her cruiser. “Watch yourself, Charlie. Freya can be intoxicating. Don’t get a broken heart on top of what else is going on. ”
I let the advice settle in, knowing that it comes from a place of kindness. “You’re a good pilot,” I say. “Let’s get drinks tonight . . . or dinner.”
Seton opens the driver’s-side door on her cruiser. “Are you asking me on a date?”
“Should I be?”
“Not till you figure out what’s going on with Freya.”
“Freya and I are friends, nothing more,” I say. “You might mention that to Gilcrest next time you see him.”
Seton sweeps hair out of my eyes, letting her hand linger on my cheek. “I told you already, I don’t want to make a mistake.”
I press my hand over hers and inch closer. “How about a friendly drink, then?”
“I’ll have to take a rain check, unless you want to get together later.”
“Are you meeting Lee?”
Seton steps away from me, her hand dropping to her side, relegating us right back to the friend zone. “I’m not dating Lee! Stop being weird. I’m on duty till ten o’clock. If you’re at the Landing when I get there, we can have a drink. Otherwise, you’re on your own.”
She slides into the driver’s seat and starts the car. I lean on the open window. “The night before the fire, Jane called your mom—”
“I know,” Seton says, cutting me off. “I know everything about the case, except what Gilcrest doesn’t tell me, which I hope isn’t very much. You, on the other hand, don’t need to know anything. In fact, the less you know, the better. It’ll keep you out of Gilcrest’s line of fire.”
“Did you get that pint glass tested for DNA?”
“I told you I would. I should have results in a few days.”
“Would you tell me if someone reported seeing my father?” I ask.
Seton closes her eyes. “Probably not,” she says. “If I help you think through why your mother called mine, will you leave the rest of the investigation alone?”
“Maybe,” I say.
“That’s the best I can hope for,” Seton says.
“Occam’s razor: Start with the simplest explanation possible, not a crazy one, and go from there.
In this case, the simplest explanation is Jane called my mom about catering, because the Landing caters most events on the lake, and that’s what most people call my mom about.
Also, Jane’s hired my mom to cater events before, even if they don’t like each other. It helps being the only game in town.”
“Why would my mother want to meet at Burkehaven? Wouldn’t she place the order over the phone?”
“Okay, think through some other ideas. Try it. What if—”
“What if,” I begin, my voice trailing off.
At first my mind’s blank, but then a fully realized idea snaps into place.
“What if my mother was planning to meet my father at Burkehaven, and somehow she wanted your mother to be there, too. What if your mother was the one who helped my father escape. She told me she drove to Sunapee the night your father was killed because you couldn’t sleep, but your mother could have been anywhere.
There was no GPS tracking then. She could have had my father hidden in the trunk of the car, and no one would have bothered to look because she was the victim’s widow—”
“Stop!” Seton says. “Remember what I said about going with the obvious? That sounds like a plot for Haviland and Kilgore, not real life.”
“It’s convoluted,” I say.
“More like ludicrous,” Seton says. “But here’s another one for you: What if Jane wanted to tell my mom to stop getting in the way of the Burkehaven project? My mom’s annoying. That’s what I’d have done in Jane’s place.”
It’s a simpler explanation. And it actually makes sense.
Seton glances at her phone. “I have to get to work,” she says.
“But keep going. What if . . . ? And keep it real. Think of the things my mom does, and how they overlap with Burkehaven. She’s a selectperson, she owns the Landing, she’s on the conservation commission.
My mom has a foot in almost anything that happens in this town.
Where did those things overlap with your mother?
If you come up with something useful, let me know. ”
After she drives off, I sit in my car. Why did my mother go to Burkehaven that morning, and why did she ask Mrs. Haviland to meet her there? And who else was lurking in the trees, waiting?
I don’t have the answers, but I know in my heart that the solution must be more complex than a catering order.
What if . . . what if . . . what if . . .
Then I remember something Seton said as we hovered in the helicopter. What if Mrs. Haviland and her crusade to save the lake had more to do with the fire at Burkehaven than anyone has realized?