“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 hadagun 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 itout 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.”
