There was that name again: Hannah.
“Helping how?”
“Hannah’s—troubled,” she said. “You know, of course, that Sam was suspended a couple of weeks ago?”
Though I did now, thanks to chatty office attendant Pam, it bothered me that this woman had known longer.
When I nodded, she continued, “I’m Hannah’s mentor, through one of those youth programs. Her foster mom is cool, but her biological mom—she’s not a nice person.”
“I don’t need backstory. I need to find my husband.” I might’ve emphasized the last two words more than necessary.
“I don’t know where Sam is. But I know where he was.” She sighed, then drained her mug. “Like I said, it’s complicated.”
“And like I said, I can handle that.”
Brooklyn set her empty mug in her lap. “I could tell you a thousand stories about Hannah, but I’ll just tell you one,” she said.
“I don’t—”
She held up her hand to silence me. I bristled, but I let her talk. “Hannah’s about four years old, and she doesn’t come when her mom calls her for lunch. According to Hannah, her mom hated it when she or her sister hid. So, of course, Hannah expects to be punished, but instead, her mom tells her she’s going to teach her to garden. She hands Hannah a pair of work gloves and a shovel. In their yard, there’s this huge oak tree, more than a hundred feet high, and her mom makes her start digging in a spot underneath. The ground is hard. It would be a challenge for an adult, and Hannah’s a child.
“As she digs, her mom asks her what she wants to grow—peppers? Roses? Snap peas? Goading her. The poor girl’s feet are bloody by this time, because, see, she’s wearing these ballet slippers. Every time Hannah puts weight on the shovel, it slices the bottom of her foot.
“When Hannah finally manages to dig a small hole, and it takes hours, her mom drops this sack on the ground next to her and says something like, ‘I know. How about we plant this?’ That’s how Hannah finds out her dog got hit by a car. It’s also her first real memory.”
The story is horrible, but I’ve come for answers, not stories. Still, I feel a pang of guilt when I ask, “Why is this relevant?”
“Because you should understand what Hannah comes from before making judgments on what she might’ve done to Sam.”
My guilt burned to ash and scattered. “And what was that?”
“Hannah was having problems in Sam’s class. He reached out to me. He was trying to help her, and it worked. Her grades and attitude improved. Then Sam and I—” She didn’t finish the sentence.
“You’re claiming you’re sleeping with my husband.” My voice cold.
“He never hid the fact he was married.”
“Is married,” I corrected.
Her eyes dropped to her lap and the empty cup there.
“He’s attractive, of course, but it was his sense of humor that got me, and his empathy. He’s a great guy.” I bit back a retort about how I knew my husband, thank you, and how “great guys” didn’t cheat.
“Glad you think so.”
Her blue eyes flashed, and at first I thought it was with shame and that an apology would follow. But when she spoke, it was in my husband’s defense, not her own.
“Hannah’s eighteen now, so even if she and Sam slept together, she was an adult at the time,” Brooklyn said. “I think it’s more likely, though, that Hannah knew what was going on between Sam and me and that she was jealous. Two people she cared about were involved in a relationship that didn’t include her. She started spreading rumors that Sam had pressed her for sex in exchange for an A. Those rumors came to the attention of the administration. You know the rest.”
Was that why Sam had kept his suspension from me—because he couldn’t separate that news from an admission that he was having an affair?
“You said you know what happened last night.”
Her face clouded, and she gave a slight nod. “We met a few blocks from your house.”
I instantly thought of our sixteen years in that house, the bedroom we shared, our kids, and felt sick. “You’ve been to our home?”
Brooklyn opened a drawer on the end table and pulled out a small bottle of tequila. She refilled her teacup before placing the bottle on the table. No pretense now.
“The night you and I met, I was leaving your house,” she said. “I had dropped off a bottle of cold medicine. That’s all.”
That may have been all that happened that night, but had there been others? And if I had arrived home earlier, would I have met Brooklyn there instead of on the trail?
As if I had asked the question aloud, she said, “I knew you were working late.”
She didn’t add that Sam had called to tell her this, but I knew. I had memorized the log of calls and texts to Brooklyn’s number. They had spoken twice the night of the attack.
The police’s suspicions of me suddenly didn’t seem so unfounded: the wife is there when her husband’s mistress is attacked, and twenty-four hours later, the husband disappears. In Detective Rico’s place, I would have questions too.
I prodded, “So you arranged to meet Sam in this neighborhood . . .”
“Near this abandoned house,” she said, and my skin prickled. I easily pictured the rotting pumpkin on the stoop and the shattered window. “We were only supposed to be a few minutes.”
“Romantic.”
“It wasn’t like that,” she objected. “We met to talk about Hannah, the allegations she’d made against him, and to come up with a plan. Find a way to salvage Sam’s reputation, while also protecting Hannah. Audrey was with a friend, and Sam and I didn’t want to leave her for too long.”
Each detail was a blow: the clandestine nature of their meeting; Brooklyn’s casual use of “Sam and I” as if they were a couple; her show of concern over my daughter. Audrey was not hers to worry about.
Though I doubted she would answer, I asked anyway, “What’s Hannah’s last name?”
She shook her head firmly. “I’m only telling you as much as I am because you saved my life, and because I want to find Sam as much as you do. But you know I can’t give you her last name.”
“I’ll find out.”
“Maybe, but not from me.” A sad smile played at the corners of her mouth. “You hate me, don’t you?”
“I don’t know you.”
“I’m sleeping with your husband. You know that.”
Brooklyn nursed her tequila and waited for my response. Finally, I said, “Not really.”
“Not really, you don’t hate me? Or you don’t really know that Sam and I are sleeping together?”
“The affair part, but I suppose both are true.” I had spent a lot of time hating as a teen, and I had no more energy for it. What energy I had was focused on a single task: finding my husband. “You said you and Sam met on Halloween. When did you last see him?”
“I’m not sure of the time, but we weren’t together more than a few minutes when I saw Carver. He must’ve been tracking my car.”
There was another possibility, one I had considered earlier but that nevertheless shook me now: Carver had been watching Sam.