“We’re
At that moment, and at countless other instances strung like a necklace of razor blades around her neck, Claire Logan could not be excised from Hannah’s thoughts—her true memories of what happened blended with the tales created and exhumed by the news media in search of a story. Marcella Hoffman had been the worst of the offenders. Seeing her at the courthouse had done nothing but push Hannah closer to the edge.
A car passed by on the street, its headlights filling the bedroom with a brightness that brought Hannah out of her thoughts. Then the car was gone. Hannah thought once more of Hoffman and wondered if she had been casing Loma Linda Avenue. A shiver went through her and she got up, pulling the afghan over her shoulders. She walked down the hall and nudged Ethan, now asleep on the sofa.
“I’m going to Kodiak,” she said.
Ethan lifted his head from the sofa pillow. “Oh, Hannah,” he said. “That’s not a good idea. Nothing comes of these trips. It just tears you up.”
“I can’t help it. I have to know.”
“What are we going to tell Amber this time?”
“I have business in Alaska.”
“Not that. What are we going to say to our daughter if this woman is your mother, her grandmother? Or what if Marcella Hoffman decides to write an update about you and your life? What are we going to say to Amber?”
Hannah didn’t have an explanation, though she’d considered the problem a million times.
“Scoot over and hold me,” she said. She climbed on the sofa next to Ethan and he put his arms around her. There was barely enough room to hold the two of them on the narrow sofa cushions, but it didn’t matter. With the world spinning out of control, Hannah Logan Griffin fell asleep.
The next morning, Hannah found herself in bed at 6 a.m. Ethan was already dressed.
“How?” she asked sleepily, remembering the night before.
“Carried you here. The two of us don’t fit on the couch,” he said, patting his stomach. “One of us needs to diet.”
Ethan said nothing about what they had discussed the night before. He saw no point in it. He told Hannah that he and Amber would “single-dad” it again.
“Thanks,” she said, sitting up and sliding her feet to the floor. “This will be the last time.”
“I hope so, but I doubt it.”
She had printed out online airline boarding passes that included a commuter flight from Santa Louisa’s airport to LAX and a connection in Seattle that would put her in Anchorage late that night. Another flight would get her into Kodiak around midnight. It was the best she could do. It gave her a few hours in the office. Everything was planned to the minute. She’d call Bauer from Anchorage. From home, she changed her office voice mail to indicate she’d be out in the field all day, but to please leave a message as she checked them frequently.
Marcella Hoffman was waiting outside the main lab door. Wearing an ecru suit and jade blouse, Hoffman waved at Hannah.
“Morning,” she said.
Hannah felt her stomach drop. “What are you doing here?”
“Had breakfast with Ted Ripperton and just hoping that I’d run into you. Saw the news last night. Think she’s your mom?” Hannah ignored her question, and Hoffman followed her into her office.
“What exactly is your connection to Liz Wheaton?” Hannah asked, setting down and opening her briefcase, revealing her airplane tickets among file folders bearing the name
“Friends, I told you yesterday. We became friendly when I did my ten-year-after update.”
“Do you know where she worked?”
Hoffman made a face as she sat down. Her eyes lit on the plane tickets, and seeing that, Hannah closed her briefcase. “I’m supposed to ask the questions,” Hoffman said. “Unless, of course, I’m on the witness stand.”
“Consider it just that. I’m sure you know all of this, but play dumb for my benefit. I got a package not long ago. A package from Spruce County. Stolen evidence.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Hoffman shifted in the visitor’s chair.
“I said to
“I had nothing to do with the shoes. All I wanted was your address. Liz provided me the information. Got it from her son’s parole folder. Your address was there… you know to be contacted in the event Wheaton ever escaped from prison.”
“What does Liz Wheaton want from me?”
“She never said.”
“Get out of my office. Or I will call security.”
“You wouldn’t dare.”
“Watch me.” She picked up the phone and pushed zero. “I’ll have your ass in jail for stealing criminal records. I never said the package contained any shoes.”
Like a cockroach terrified of the saber-beam of a flashlight, Hoffman scuttled out the door. An hour later, Hannah was at the Santa Louisa airport headed toward the one and only gate served by Orange Leaf Air.
The gigantic stuffed polar bear at the Anchorage airport was startling at any time of day, but in the evening, after flying for hours and a couple of glasses of wine, the fourteen-foot taxidermist’s dream looked like a monster. Preoccupied with a volatile mix of hope, anxiety, and fear, Hannah Griffin didn’t notice the white monstrosity until she looked up while fiddling with the contents of her purse after the long flight from Seattle. She nearly dropped everything. It was 11:30 and the travel gods had smiled on her: the flight to Kodiak had been delayed thirty minutes.
She composed herself, found a phone booth, and dialed the number of the Northern Lights Motor Inn. It rang a dozen times before an obviously snoozing night clerk answered and took her reservation for a room for that night, before patching her over to Bauer’s room.
“I’m coming to Kodiak,” she announced with an exaggerated confidence that even she didn’t buy, despite where she was.
Bauer attempted to shake off his sleepiness and the residual fogginess of one-too-many glasses of Wild Turkey. “Not a good idea,” he said. “Nothing you can do here.”
“I’ll be there in an hour. I’m at the Anchorage airport now.”
“Jesus Christ,” he said. “Can’t you let me do my job first?”
Hannah looked around the airport and spoke quietly. “I’ve waited a long time for this, too. If Louise Wallace is my mother, I have a right to see her before the circus—the media circus—comes to Alaska and takes over.”
Bauer exhaled a loud sigh. “Like I told you earlier, we really don’t know who Wallace is or isn’t. Really, I understand your position and I wish I had done a better job of preempting the shock of the news story yesterday. I wish I had.”
“Can we discuss this in the morning?” Hannah asked.
“Okay, it’s late,” he said, feeling a little relieved. “Where can I reach you?”
“In the room next to yours,” she said. “I just made reservations.”
Bauer’s relief evaporated. “Just great,” he muttered. “See you at seven.”
Right on schedule an hour later, Hannah, her big purse, and a small carry-on bag waited for a taxi on the curb in front of Kodiak’s small-fry airport. The air was surprisingly warm—not California balmy, of course, but warmer than she imagined Alaska would be. She thought of the Orlando trip she’d made in search of her mother. She hated Florida because of the experience and even turned down the opportunity to participate in a sex abuse conference held just outside Walt Disney World. Amber, she knew, would have loved Disney. Waiting, Hannah hoped that Alaska, at the opposite end of the country, would be different. She even prayed it would be. She hoped that the woman Bauer had seen was indeed her mother.
Over the years, Hannah had seen flashes of her mother’s visage in the faces of so many women. She saw her mother’s features in a woman sweeping up spilled popcorn at the mall. The middle-aged woman was hunched over, shoving the broom as though she intended to scrape the surface of its waxy sheen. Hannah even tapped the woman
