Cold River - Carla Neggers [2]
“I do,” Hannah whispered.
She stared at her chardonnay, wondering where the words had come from. Why was Bowie even back in Black Falls? Short-fused and on the verge of doing time, he had finally figured out that he and his hometown weren’t a good mix and moved up to Burlington ten years ago. Last October, he’d purchased his family’s old place out on the river. He’d spent the rest of the fall and the winter fixing it up and had moved in a few weeks ago.
Hannah could see her father leading her and Bowie through the woods above the river as they searched for old cellar holes—the foundations of long-abandoned homes. He’d imagine where those early Vermont settlers had ended up. Ohio? Wisconsin? San Francisco? He’d turn to them with a grin and ask why his ancestors hadn’t cleared out of northern New England.
He and Bowie both had always been at their happiest, their most controlled, in the woods.
Hannah wasn’t yet fourteen when her father died. Her younger brothers didn’t remember him at all. Devin was two, Toby just one. Nine years later, they lost their mother to an infection from a tick bite. Hannah had navigated the legal battles to become her brothers’ legal guardian. They were eighteen and seventeen now. They’d be out on their own before long.
A loud male voice shouting insults from a table toward the back of the bar drew Hannah’s attention. She didn’t think the insults were directed at anyone in particular, but she didn’t intend to stick around to find out. She eased off the stool and reached for her jacket on the floor. She slipped a ten-dollar bill out of a pocket, tucked it under her glass and turned to leave.
The voice grew louder.
Derek Cutshaw.
Although she couldn’t make out what he was saying, Hannah tensed as she started for the door. Derek and his friends Robert Feehan and Brett Griffin had been in O’Rourke’s when she’d arrived. They were private ski instructors who didn’t live in Black Falls but would sometimes stop at the café on their way to Killington, Okemo or Stratton. They’d struck her as arrogant, but she’d never had serious trouble with them.
She’d never seen them drunk, either.
“I see you took off your apron to sit at the bar and booze it up.” Derek chortled, obviously pleased with himself. “Good for you, Hannah. You wouldn’t want people to think you were your mother’s daughter.”
She laid her jacket over one arm. So. His insults were directed at her. Her mother had worked at O’Rourke’s, making a living for her and her three children. Had she endured comments—however rare—from people who had their own prejudices and fantasies about an attractive young widow of limited means?
Derek didn’t relent. “A secondhand jacket for a secondhand girl.”
Robert laughed at his friend’s awkward insult and gave him a better gibe to try on her, but Derek shifted to bragging about his recent female conquests. Hannah felt her face grow hot. Do they mean me? Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the Camerons look over from their table. Would they hear the insults and innuendos and believe them?
Embarrassed and angry, she headed for the door. She didn’t care how cold it was outside, she had no intention of spending another second listening to drunken insults.
“Hold on, there,” Derek yelled. “You can’t leave. Who the hell do you think you are?”
Hannah could see him coming toward her from the back of the bar and jumped back, dropping her jacket. She stepped on the sleeve and slipped just as Derek got to her, swearing, drunkenly slurring the taunts he aimed at her. She tried to find her footing but couldn’t. She went down hard, putting out her hands to brace her fall. Pain radiated up both arms, but she immediately got up onto her knees.
Derek and his friend Robert both stood over her now, laughing. Derek bent down and got in her face. He was as fair as she was and very fit, clad in ski clothes, but his face was contorted with anger, entitlement and alcohol. “That’s a good position