Dylan gave a mock salute to a uniformed technician as he and Zach jogged to the chopper and climbed inside.

He checked a row of switches and plugged in the headset. “You want me to drop you at the office?”

“What are your plans?” asked Zach. He wasn’t in a hurry to be alone with his own frustrations. He had a lot of thinking to do, but first he wanted to sleep on it, start fresh, maybe forget that he’d screwed up so badly with Kaitlin.

“I’m going up to the island,” said Dylan. “Aunt Ginny’s been asking about me, and I promised I’d drop in.”

“Mind if I tag along?”

Dylan shot him a look of surprise. Aunt Ginny could most charitably be described as eccentric. Her memory was fading, and for some reason she’d decided Zach was a reprobate. She also liked to torture the family’s Stradivarius violin and read her own poetry aloud.

“She has two new Pekingese,” Dylan warned.

Zach didn’t care. The island had always been a retreat for him. He needed to clear his head and then come up with a contingency plan.

“I hope your dad still stocks the thirty-year-old Glenlivet,” he told Dylan.

“I think we can count on that.” Dylan started the engine, and the chopper’s rotor blades whined to life.

Two

A week later, Kaitlin met her best friend, law professor Lindsay Rubin, in the park behind Seamount College in midtown. The cherry trees were in full bloom, scenting the air, their petals drifting to the walkway as the two women headed toward the lily pad-covered duck pond. It was lunchtime on a Wednesday, and the benches were filled with students from the college, along with businesspeople from the surrounding streets. Moms and preschool kids picnicked on blankets that dotted the lush grass.