Total pages in book: 73
Estimated words: 71843 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 359(@200wpm)___ 287(@250wpm)___ 239(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 71843 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 359(@200wpm)___ 287(@250wpm)___ 239(@300wpm)
“That’s nice.”
Lucy shook her head.
“It wasn’t nice?”
Hannah scrunched up her face. “So I went over and sat by her, and she took off the pin and handed it to me, and already I know from the eye it’s not a Takahashi, but it’s all kinds of wrong. The colors are dull, not like the bright ones you always see, the lacquer is thin, the legs are wood like the rest of her bird when they should be copper wire, and the wings aren’t curved. But the worst thing is, the actual pin part is attached with screws.”
“Dead giveaway,” Lucy said authoritatively. “Hannah explained to her that they should have been tiny push pins, never screws.”
Oh God. “And then what?”
“Well then, she’s totally bummed because she spent, like, three hundred dollars on it and it’s a fake.”
“You felt bad for telling her.”
“Yeah,” she said sadly, exhaling sharply. “I mean, I didn’t mean to upset her.”
“And so when Uncle Aaron came out, he saw you feeling bad and took you shopping?”
“Yeah,” she said, smiling up at me. “And he got Lucy an awesome pair of sunglasses too. They’re like Audrey Hepburn’s in Breakfast at Tiffany’s.”
“Got it. So then what did you guys do?”
“Oh,” Hannah said stiffly, and the way her voice fell, I had to wonder who she thought she was kidding. “Then we just came home.”
I nodded. “Didn’t go anywhere else?”
“We actually went by my house really quick, Mr. Harcourt, and picked up some of my clothes so I’d have something to wear.”
I crossed my arms and looked from my kid to her friend. “So, Lucy,” I began gently. “Honey, I really need to speak to your mother.”
There was hand-wringing then, along with a pair of big, limpid blue eyes filled with worry.
“I just need to know that it’s okay that you stay here another night or nights,” I said gently, not knowing what the full story was but being able to guess at least a bit of it.
Last fall, Luke Benedetti had returned to school from summer vacation as Lucy. During that same period, Lucy’s mother had gotten remarried to a man with two sons. One of them was seventeen, as Kola was now, he’d be eighteen in September, and one of them was fifteen, just like Hannah and Lucy, who would both be sixteen at different months later in the year. I wasn’t sure what the family dynamic was now, but Lucy’s stepfather, unlike her own father, who was deployed in Afghanistan at the moment, was not supportive of the change.
“I talked to your mom last Thursday, and she said you could stay a few days if that was okay with me, and it was because you’re neater than Hannah––”
“Hey!”
“But it’s Monday now so…I think I should call.”
Hannah’s lips pinched tight, and Lucy was back to twisting her hands together.
“Talk to me or talk to the chief deputy,” I told them.
Hannah tipped her head like she was considering that, and since that never happened—everyone knew I was the one you wanted to give bad news to—I was instantly suspicious.
“Sam,” I called to him, hearing him come back downstairs from securing his gun and changing his clothes. “Can you come in here?”
He looked good in faded jeans, his Feminist T-shirt, and a heavy cardigan. “What’s going—take off the sunglasses in the house, you’re not hiding from paparazzi,” he told his daughter, scowling at her.
The second they came off; I saw the bruised cheek and black eye.
“Hannah Kage, you lied to me!”
“No,” she said softly, calmly. “I didn’t lie, because I got the sunglasses way before I was hit. I just didn’t want you to see because I’m embarrassed.”
“We need to go to the hospital,” I said urgently. “Let’s go get your––”
“Stop!” Sam yelled, his voice bouncing off the walls as he moved quickly, always faster than I thought a man of his size should be able to, and was in front of his daughter in seconds.
Taking Hannah’s face in his hands, he gently tipped her face up to him so he could look at the damage. “Your nose isn’t broken, and it looks like that’s as swollen as that eye’s going to get.”
She nodded as she smiled at her father.
Turning to me, he reached out and cupped my cheek, his other hand still on his daughter.
“I’m sorry I yelled. I was just surprised.”
“Of course you were. So was I.”
He nodded and then gently took Hannah into his arms, holding her against his chest, rubbing her back. “Sweetheart…who hit you?”
The question sounded sort of benign, like he was asking her something that was of little consequence. She glanced at me then, and I saw her eyes narrow.
“After we saw Uncle Aaron, me and Lucy went to get some more of her stuff from her house, and when we went in her room, her stepbrother came in and started yelling at us.”