His gaze skimmed over each of us. Gone was his puppy dog enthusiasm. He’d flipped into serious business mode. “I’d think you’d want to make sure whatever I say about you is accurate.”
He put his card on the nearest table. “I hope to hear from at least one of you soon.”
Chapter Eleven
Hanna
This nightmare day refused to end. Between the hearing and the women, and a guy with a load of information he shouldn’t have, I might never sleep again.
If I still drank on a regular basis now would be the time to overindulge. I stopped completely when Jeremy still roamed around in diapers. The fear of losing him, of someone swooping in and taking him away from me because I was too underage or didn’t possess the mothering skills other women were blessed with, ruled all my actions for years. It wasn’t until Jeremy graduated from high school last year that I allowed myself a drink now and then.
He was an adult but there were things he could not know. Bits of a story that could ruin our relationship. Ruin everything.
All of those carefully tucked away secrets vibrated with renewed life. They waited in the murky darkness, ready to burst out and smash everything I’d worked for into pieces. The impending peril blanketed me like a cloak. Choked the air out of me.
“Well, that sucked.” I needed to say the words out loud, so I did.
“Now what?” Marni hadn’t eased the hold on her bag. It sat strangled in her arms in front of her. She stayed balanced on the stool but looked like she could topple at any moment.
“We fight back,” Stella said with her usualstorm the gatesattitude.
I didn’t have the energy for this nonsense or the tact necessary to maneuver around it. “Be serious. How? What? Where? We have no idea what’s coming or who that guy really is.”
“This is unbelievable.” Marni curled forward, cradling her bag. “I need a minute to think.”
Stella watched Marni. Stared, then shook her head in what looked like disgust. Stella was not a fan of weakness.
“I’ll handle him,” Stella said. “That’s what I do.”
Yeah, nothing scary about that comment. “Meaning?”
Stella’s frustrated sigh didn’t need an explanation. “I’ll do research, Hanna. Figure out how Gabe Harbison fits in the Tanner saga. What the hell did you think I meant?”
I had no idea because I didn’t really know her. We’d been in the Tanner house many times. Together but not really. Back then I was the hired help Victoria didn’t trust. Stella roamed the rooms, welcome and wanted. We walked past each other, barely speaking. Until that day.
I ran out the back door of the Tanner house, the one off the mudroom, and knocked right into her. Her unusually harried look and jittery behavior, out of breath and her hair mussed, suggested she’d been running in and out of the house. Neither of us mentioned the blood. The glaring streaks of red. The signs of violence. Didn’t explain. Didn’t ask for help. Didn’t call the police.
I’d been so afraid of losing Jeremy, of messing up and forfeiting the tiny bit of control I had over my life, that I forfeited my decency instead. I’d struggled for years to find it again. The question that haunted me... what was Stella so afraid of back then that madeherstay silent?
I knew from watching in the years since that Stella moved on with ease. She had her life together. She always wore the perfect outfit with a thin bracelet of diamonds that telegraphed her position in society, which was far above mine. The wedding ring had been gone for more than a decade, but she still threw around her ex’s name whenever the mood suited her.
The idea of putting on a constant public performance of happiness and satisfaction made my chest hurt. The aloof, you-can’t-touch-me attitude had to be a shield. The obvious question about why Stella needed that outer armor so much begged to be asked.
She also worked on my last frayed nerve. “Again, maybe amp down on the bullshit for a few minutes.”
“Sorry. I just...” The bluster visibly ran out of Stella. Totally out of character. She sat down at the table a short distance away, looking deflated compared to a minute ago. “He’s guessing about what happened that day. He has to be. Right?”
The change in attitude was a surprise. I didn’t have time to dissect it now, but I would later. “Unless someone told him.”
“Like who?” Marni’s soft voice barely registered above the steady hum of the overhead lights. “I don’t even know who lived through that night other than us.”
“Aubrey,” Stella said.
I was starting to hate the sound of that woman’s name. “Yeah. Her.”
Stella blew out a long, exasperated sigh. “I’m not at the top of my game. Theories and questions and spilling our guts will have to wait.”
“It’s simple. Aubrey did it or knows who did, but did what exactly?”
