“Maybe you should know,” Nick said. “Maybe that’s exactly what you need,” he added almost to himself. “How did we finally find her? After forty-two days and seventeen hours? A neighbor smelled something, reported it. All that time…” He shook his head. “All that time she’d been just twenty miles from my house.
“The smell ended up being his own mother. He’d killed her at some point and…God, I felt like I’d been looking for her forever. A lifetime. It was a lifetime. Following every lead. Threatening every suspect.”
Stephen stood at the window now. Looking out but not seeing. His stomach already revolting, knowing Hannah had barely touched on the horror.
“And then we found her. The nightmare ended, only to start a new one. I can still see it, still smell it. The odor was…All I could think going into that basement was, she’s dead. And then I saw her and I was sure of it. So tiny, like a broken doll. Almost unrecognizable. He’d used a bat. A knife. Cuts, slices. Some healing, others festering. Both legs were broken in multiple places, same as her arms. Three were compound. Hands broken. Ribs. A punctured lung. If we hadn’t found her when we did…” Nick’s voice broke. “She was so cold.”
Stephen felt the acid filling his mouth, but he would hear all of it.
“Lips busted, eyes swollen shut. A crude IV line we later learned he’d used to keep her alive. And awake. When I think about what she went through…Hey. Sit down. You’re whiter than death.”
“I’m good.” He choked out the words but they both knew it was a lie. How could he ever be good again?
“If you’re going to be sick, don’t do it in here.”
He took a deep breath in and out through his nose. “Finish it.”
Nick closed his eyes for a long second, like he needed a reprieve as well. “We didn’t know if she’d ever walk again. Speak again. Didn’t know if she’d ever function.”
How does someone function after something like that?
“Eventually she went home, though she had so many surgeries it didn’t seem like she was really home. Drugged out of her mind. Screaming from nightmares, from the dark. Even screamed when we touched her. Jesus Christ, she was like my child and I couldn’t even hug her.”
Nick’s voice shook, mirroring what Stephen felt inside.
“Did he…” He couldn’t say it and thankfully Nick knew.
“No. They don’t think he could. But he did…other things.”
“Is he alive?” The words burned on his tongue.
“Yes. Doing life in Connecticut state pen, though there’s rumblings of moving him to a downgraded mental facility. I’m not going to let that happen. You know, he got more time for killing his mother than for what he did to Hannah?”
So Nick hadn’t killed him. He wanted to ask why. And what would Special Agent Walker think if he could see inside Stephen’s own mind?
“The FBI thought it best to get me to another state, probably right. And it was best for her as well, but believe me, I’m counting the days until he dies. And right or wrong, I will rejoice. To know that sick motherfucker is still breathing air in this world…” Nick shook his head.
Neither man spoke for several seconds. “I want to take her away from here,” Stephen said when Nick finally looked at him. “Out of town. I don’t need your permission, and I didn’t have to come to you, but I figured it would cause Hannah less grief in the long run if I did.”
“Where?”
“I have a business thing in Vegas. Just for the night. It’ll be fun for her, good for her.” Or that was the plan.
Nick heaved a weary sigh. He picked up a different mug and put it down.
“I get it,” Stephen said. “The hostility. The anger.” It all made sense. Hannah’s body always covered, her apprehension, her fear. Luke losing it over her going to a stranger’s house. She was more child to them than sister. “If she was my sister, I’d want to wrap her up, hide her away. But she wouldn’t be happy like that. I even get that you might not care. But I’m taking her.”
“I swore I’d never let another man hurt her. You can take that as more than a warning. It’s a promise.”
Stephen gave a small nod of understanding and left Nick’s office. If he did hurt her, he’d deserve whatever he got.
Chapter 27
With a satisfied smile, Stephen watched Hannah take in the suite. The owner’s penthouse in five-star hotels tended to be lavishly over-the-top. His was no exception. Leather and glass. Marble and chandeliers. Giant sprays of flowers and assorted white candles. An enormous fireplace rose two stories to the ceiling, and there was another in the bedroom, still another in the bath.
And making use of that could be fun. Hannah in bubbles.
Thirty-eight-hundred square feet of sophisticated opulence and Hannah walked past it all and directly to the wall of glass overlooking the city. So like her, looking outside instead of in. Looking around her and not seeing herself, how beautiful she was. How special.
It had been the same on the flight here aboard the company’s Twin Star. The cream leather interior, full bar, and hors d’oeuvres had impressed even his most discerning companions. But not Hannah. She’d politely declined the champagne, more interested in the clouds outside than anything within. Until he kissed her. Then he was graced with one hundred percent of her attention and he couldn’t get enough.