Chapter Eleven Hanna
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 usual storm the gates attitude.
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 made her stay 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?”
Stella made a strangled sound. “Marni, come on. You’re a smart woman.”
That tone. Sharp and condescending. Totally unnecessary. It was like watching bullying on the school playground in real time.
I didn’t like it when a stronger personality loomed over a weaker one back then. I despised it now.
“You’re wading back into bullshit territory.” I slipped into the role of reluctant defender, wishing someone else would take
a turn. “None of us are at our best right now. None of us are in control either and I know you hate that.”
“You don’t?” Stella shook her head. “I have Everly to worry about. You have Jeremy.”
Marni’s head snapped up and her expression turned fierce. “For the record, you don’t need to have a kid to be in danger here.”
“I didn’t mean—”
“Okay.” That conversation couldn’t lead anywhere helpful, so time for a redirect. “Look, today has been wild. Terrible. Confusing.
Scary. All of that.” The situation called for harsher words, but those were the only ones my brain could muster at the moment.
Marni shrugged. “Maybe we deserve this.”
“Possibly.” And by that I meant yes. “We have a shared objective. The years of us not speaking, of pretending we don’t know more, has to end. We need to find out
where Aubrey has been, what she plans to do, and how much this Gabe person knows and from what sources.”
No one said anything for a few seconds. Stella was the one to break the silence. “So, we work together.”
Marni shrugged. “I never understood why we had to keep our distance for all these years. All it did was make the paranoia
fester.”
The blood I saw on her hands. That’s why.
Red dripping from Marni’s fingers. Her palms slick with the damning evidence. I’d heard the yelling. I saw the blood and her
stunned expression. She’d cleaned up by the time she slipped from the house to run away. But did that sort of stain ever really
wash off?
What had she done?
“We’re in this together.” I focused on Stella, hoping she’d let Marni’s comment pass. “You’ll look into Gabe.”
“I’ll see if Cam knows anything about the guy or Xavier’s estate planning,” Marni said.
That last part made me twitchy. “We can stay in touch via text. Keep it coded. I actually don’t know what that means but it’s
a thing I’ve heard Jeremy say.”
“Unless something else happens, we’ll wait until we have more information to meet again.” Stella glanced at her watch. “That
should give us time to take a breath.”
Sure. Plenty of time. But I wasn’t in the mood to argue with Stella. Ever, really. “Fine.”
Marni stood up, clearly ready to bolt for the door. “Yep.”
Stella continued to issue orders. “If anyone asks, we’re meeting for a potential community project.”
This seemed like a good place to end the covert, terrifying meeting. Not that any part of this plan really qualified as an
ending. This was a beginning. “Excellent. Everybody out.”
I needed space and time to think before Aubrey took her next shot. It was coming. Soon. She wanted us off-balance and she’d
succeeded.