He passed the tall cyclone fence that surrounded the small airport and took a left into the parking lot. There was a sprawling one-story concrete-block building between the lot and the runway, and one door that had a light over it, so he went inside, where he found a closed ticket desk and a couple of vending machines. The clock over the door leading to the runway was eight minutes fast, according to his watch, so he searched his pockets for change for the soda machine and dropped the coins in. A can landed with a thud that reverberated through the empty room, attracting the attention of the night watchman, who came out of a side room to see who had invaded his space. He and Sam made small talk until they saw the lights from an approaching plane. Sam stood in the window and watched the small craft land effortlessly. Moments later, the plane’s door opened, and steps appeared. Fiona had a bag over her shoulder and another in her hands. She was wearing a white shirt and a black linen skirt that looked as if she’d slept in it.

Sam tossed his soda can into a trash container and went out to meet her halfway across the tarmac. He put out one hand to take her bag.

“I have it,” she said. “But thanks.”

“How was your flight?”

“Very nice.” She seemed to be deliberately keeping about a foot between them. Sam wasn’t sure why, but he let her have the space.

She turned back to the plane, and watched the steps retract, the door close, and the plane ready to take off again. She stood in silence till it had taxied down the runway, taken flight, and disappeared into the night sky.

“Whose plane, if I might ask?”

“It was Hugh’s. His son, Matt, offered to fly me back here on his way to Chicago. It was the quickest way, so I said yes.” She smiled weakly. “Of course, his wife and kids were on the flight as well, and I’d forgotten just how loud a bunch of teenagers could be. Still, it beat hanging out at LAX by a country mile.”

The security guard waved and called out, “Night, folks” as they passed through the building, and Sam returned the wave.

“It’s so quiet out here,” Fiona whispered, as if afraid to break the silence.

“Nothing around for miles,” he noted. “Well, there is Brightcliffe, about a mile and a half through that pasture.” He pointed across the road. “But they rolled up the sidewalks hours ago.”

He unlocked the car and put her things in the trunk.

“Did you come by yourself?” She frowned. “Why didn’t someone come with you?”

“No need. No one followed me, I can guarantee that. The road between here and Blackstone is straight and flat. There’s nowhere to hide if you’re trying to tail someone. I didn’t see but maybe one or two cars on the way out here, and they were both headed in the opposite direction.”

“I didn’t mean for you to take any risks, Sam.”

“I haven’t.”

Then, to change the subject, he asked, “Are you hungry?”

“Not so much.”

“I don’t know why I asked that.” He rubbed his hand over his face. “There’s nothing around for miles except the vending machines inside, but the offerings looked pretty stale to me.”

“Really, I’m fine.” Fiona buckled her seat belt.

“We’ll be back at the farm soon. There’s lots of stuff there to dig into.”

He started the car and drove out of the lot and onto the highway. Within seconds he was up to what he considered traveling speed. He sat back, trying to think of something to say to her.

Before he could come up with anything that he didn’t think sounded lame, Fiona said, “I’m sorry that I left like that. I should have explained, but I was blindsided when I got the call about Hugh.”

He looked across the console and met her eyes. “Well, I’m sorry, too. I’m sorry that your friend died.”

“He was more than just a friend, Sam. He was the father I needed but didn’t have.”

“I thought your parents were still alive.”

“They are, but they never treated me as if I were their child.” She stared out the window for a moment. “I’m guessing you saw some of the coverage of Hugh’s funeral, that you saw me there. You were probably a little surprised.”

“Everyone saw you there, and yeah, everyone was surprised, to say the least. Me, in particular. A little background right about now might be nice.”

“I’m not sure where to start.”

“Try where the story begins.”

“My parents started me in commercials when I was six months old. They found it could be quite lucrative-I was a pretty baby and apparently quite animated-so my mother quit her job to take me to auditions and shoots. I got an agent and she got me a lot of work. When I got a little older, everyone thought I should be on TV. I got lucky, got picked up for a couple of walk-on scenes, then a couple of small speaking parts. Right about then, my mother decided she’d be a better agent than the one I had-the one who’d gotten me all the work-so she fired her. From then on, my mother, as my agent, and my dad, as my manager, controlled my career. When I was four, I auditioned for the part of the lead’s daughter on a new show called McGuire, Boston PD. I got the part. Much to everyone’s surprise, the show lasted for nine seasons.”

“It shouldn’t have been too much of a surprise,” he said. “It was a damned good show. Drama with the right touch of humor.”

“You’ve seen it, then.”

“When it first ran, yeah, I did. I never connected you with little Nora McGuire, though.”

“No reason you should have. They thought Nora should be this angelic-looking little girl, so they dyed my dark hair blond. As soon as I could, I went back to my natural color.” She was staring out the window again. “Anyway, my parents were the stage parents from hell. They were totally into the Hollywood TV scene. By the time I was nine or ten, I just wanted out. I was going through a very self-conscious stage, and I didn’t want to do it anymore. But when I told my mother I wanted to quit, she went nuts. Went on and on about how I had an obligation to my family, that if I quit I’d be taking the roof from over their heads, and how could I do that to my little brother and sister, not to mention to my parents, who had given up their lives so that I could follow my dream of being a TV star.”

“Was it?” Sam asked. “Your dream?”

“When I first started, it was fun. I can’t deny that. Everyone paid a lot of attention to me, made a big fuss over me. But after a while, it became suffocating. I couldn’t go anywhere without people approaching me. I had no friends because I was either studying or on the set most of the day. I became very shy around kids my own age because I didn’t know any. I didn’t know how to interact with other children. So it all got old very quickly. It didn’t take long for me to figure out that it wasn’t my dream I was following, it was my mom’s. She liked the spotlight, liked being Nora McGuire’s mother.”

“Sounds like they were getting a lot more out of it than you were.”

“You have no idea, Sam,” she told him. “I grew to hate the whole thing. The only real friend I had was Hugh Davenport, my TV dad. When I got upset, he was the one who calmed me down. When I was depressed, he talked me through it. When I needed help with my homework, he worked with me between scenes. He was the one who gave me advice, he was the one I turned to when I needed someone to talk to. After a time, our TV roles sort of slipped into our real lives. He was more of a dad to me than my real dad ever was. Sometimes he took me home to be with his kids and do things with them-he had three sons and two daughters. He and his wife were the parents I needed, the parents I’d wished my mom and dad would be. There was so much warmth in their home, and never any in my own.”

She smiled in the darkness. “Hugh understood what I was going through because he’d been a child star, too. He saw my parents pushing me into roles I didn’t want-I made a movie every year after the TV season ended. He saw how lonely I was, and he even tried to talk to my folks, but they just got pissed off at him. Anyway, by the time I was about seven, I decided I wanted to be just like him. I wanted to be a cop, just like the one he played on TV. I never wanted to be anything else.”