Cold River - Carla Neggers [77]
Well. That wasn’t all.
He wanted to make love to her. He avoided glancing at his brother or Jo lest it showed in his eyes just what he was thinking.
“I’m not staying,” Hannah said as she approached the fire, acknowledging him, Jo and Elijah with a stiff smile. “Nice to see you all. I’ll just get straight to the point. I came to tell you that I got to thinking about the foundation at your father’s cabin and decided to check it out. My father was a stonemason. A good one. I thought…”
When she stopped, Elijah stepped closer to her. “Go on.”
Her bruised cheek stood out against the glow of the fire. “I’ve been wondering how Drew found that old cellar hole and if he could have handled rebuilding the foundation on his own. I went up to see if being there would help me figure out the answers. It didn’t. That’s it. That’s all I know.”
No one said anything. Sean realized they were fixed on Hannah. No wonder she was defensive and felt isolated, as if they were ganging up on her.
He couldn’t let that deter him, and finally he said, “What about Bowie?”
“What about him, Sean?”
“He walked into the café yesterday, and you bolted up the mountain in twenty-degree weather by yourself.”
“One thing doesn’t necessarily have to do with the other.”
“In this case—”
“I used to go out hunting cellar holes with my father as a kid. Bowie did, too. After my father died, I’d go out in the woods by myself. I’d find an old cellar hole and see a rosebush still growing by a stone wall, and I’d imagine myself back in time.” She paused. “I remember seeing your dad and Elijah hiking up on the mountain.”
“I don’t remember that,” Elijah said.
“You never knew I was there. I was hiding by a stone wall. Your father had you go on ahead, and he came back to me and saw me home.”
“How old were you?”
“Thirteen. That means you were seventeen.”
“Did you ever find the cellar hole where Drew built his cabin?” Jo interjected.
Hannah shook her head. “No, I didn’t. I don’t know if anyone else did.”
“Bowie or your father, you mean.”
Her turquoise eyes were cool and controlled, but Hannah reacted by straightening her spine, as if she knew Jo suspected her, knew she was still keeping secrets.
Jo grabbed a black iron poker and stirred the coals in the fire as she spoke. “You hike up to the cabin and not thirty minutes after you’re back down the mountain, you hear someone calling your name, and you’re knocked over in the cemetery.”
“Correct.”
Jo set the poker back on its rack. “You’re protective of your brothers. Anyone in your position would be.”
“My position?”
“Devin’s just been through an ordeal. He was suspected of stalking another teenager and stealing—”
“But he didn’t stalk Nora, and he didn’t steal. He was framed.”
“He had a rough time after he found Drew’s body on Cameron Mountain. He was in some trouble—”
“I’m not making excuses for him.”
Sean exchanged a look with Elijah, but neither of them spoke, letting the federal agent and the budding lawyer go.
“Devin found Drew when no one else could,” Jo said, “but he should have told one of us.”
“I know.” Hannah’s voice was just above a whisper. “I’d give anything if I’d gone up the mountain instead of him. If I’d at least been with him.”
Jo didn’t relent. “Then you of all people know that you should tell us what’s on your mind now, Hannah. What you know, what you theorize, what you suspect. What you’re afraid of.”
Hannah tightened her hands into fists. Sean noticed her wince in pain and figured she must have momentarily forgotten about her injured wrist. She didn’t so much as glance at either him or Elijah. “What else, Agent Harper?” she asked.
“How well do your brothers know Bowie?”
“They hardly know him at all,” Hannah said, guarded, her emotions contained.
“You want Bowie to be innocent.”
“Of course. Don’t you?”
“That’s not the point.”
Elijah eased in next to Jo and winked at Hannah. “You don’t like being wrong,