Vance swipes at his eyes too. “Your mother and I, we used to meet at Burkehaven to watch the sun set. Things are changing there so quickly, with all the building. I wanted to capture what the cove looked like in my memory before those houses go up. That’s why I went over there to take photos.”
“How long were you together?” I ask.
“A few months, though we’ve known each other for years. We’ve worked on dozens of projects, saw each other socially, but my wife, Evelyn, got sick last winter. Jane was kind to her. She’d come to the hospital almost every week to play cribbage, bring cookies, try to get Evelyn to eat. Evelyn kept telling me, right up until the day she died, that there’d be someone for me after she was gone. It was the last thing in the world I ever could have contemplated, but then later ...” Vance blows his nose. “I shouldn’t have come to Burkehaven that day, when you and I met the first time. I tried to force your mother’s hand. I wanted her to tell you about us and to make it official, but Jane wasn’t sure if you were ready.”
I think back on the night I spoke to my mother in her room. She said there was something she wanted to tell me, and I’d assumed it was a secret about my father. Maybe all she wanted was to share that she was ready to move on with her life. I wish she’d had the chance so I could have been happy with her.
“You look stunned,” Vance says. “It’s a lot to take in.”
“This isn’t what I expected,” I say.
He offers a hand. “I’m glad to know you, though I wish it was better circumstances.”
I take his hand in mine, and in a way it feels as though I’m reaching through time and touching a part of my mother’s life I never knew existed. We talk for a few more moments and promise to get together sometime soon, a promise I’m not sure we’ll keep. Though now that I own half of Reid Construction, we’ll probably work together in someway or another. “We owe you money,” I say. “We’ll get that settled sooner rather than later.”
“It’s a few thousand dollars,” Vance says. “Leave it to Reid, okay? Your mother wouldn’t want you involved, and neither do I.”
In the truck, Freya hands me a box of tissues. “I feel like an idiot,” I say.
“For crying about your mother?” Freya asks. “That’s nothing to be embarrassed about.”
“For not seeing what was right in front of me.”
“Sometimes things don’t make sense until they do,” Freya says. “One mystery’s solved, and now other pieces will fall into place. Clear the clutter to see what’s really happening—or that’s how it worked on most of my cases.”
“You didn’t work any cases,” I say.
“So you keep telling me,” Freya says. “But I’m working one now. With you.”
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 ofScene of the Crimeout 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.
