CHAPTER FOUR — A CALL FROM LEAH
Andrew moved into a second-floor room overlooking the tennis courts.
The new room smelled of fresh towels and citrus cleaner, and the ordinary perfection of it nearly broke him.
He left his suitcase unopened and called his older sister, Camille.
She answered while driving home from work.
“Is somebody hurt?”
“Not physically.”
He told her what he had seen, choosing short sentences because longer ones made him sound hysterical.
Camille pulled over before he reached the part about Harbor Door.
“She told strangers you hit her?”
“That’s what Ethan says.”
“Are you alone?”
“Yes.
”
“Stay that way for now.”
Andrew had expected an explosion of outrage.
Instead, Camille asked whether he had eaten, whether Hannah could enter his room, and whether he had his medication in the suitcase he left upstairs.
Her attention to ordinary details made him feel less untethered.
“You should keep an exact account of what people say,” she advised.
“Not because you need a revenge folder.”
“I know.”
“Because three people now believe they’re responding to different emergencies.”
After they hung up, Andrew received an unknown call.
The woman introduced herself as Leah Marshall, Ethan’s sister.
“Ethan said I ought to talk to you,
” she began.
“I don’t usually call someone connected to an intake request.”
Andrew kept his voice guarded.
“You shouldn’t tell me anything private about someone seeking help.”
“I agree.”
She paused.
“But Ethan told me that a description of you may be false, and that affects what I repeated personally.”
“What did you repeat?”
“I told a coworker that my brother was helping a woman who couldn’t safely leave her marriage.”
Andrew closed his eyes.
Leah continued.
“I didn’t share your name at work, but I encouraged him to take her fear seriously.”
“And now?”
“Now he says she wasn’t truthful with him.
”
“She wasn’t.”
Leah waited a moment.
“I’m going to ask Hannah to speak directly with the intake coordinator.”
“Please don’t ask for her file or let me influence whether she gets help.”
“I wouldn’t.”
“I do need one thing,” Andrew said.
“Please tell Ethan not to repeat accusations about me until he’s checked them.”
“I already did.”
A silence followed.
Then Leah said something unexpected.
“My brother wasn’t always this trusting.”
Andrew looked toward the balcony.
“What happened?”
“Our father died after a difficult divorce, and Ethan spent years believing he’d ignored warning signs about how badly the adults around him were treating one another.
”
“I’m sorry.”
“Hannah knew that story.”
Andrew felt a new and unpleasant possibility take shape.
She had not merely lied to Ethan about Andrew.
She had chosen a version of events that would make Ethan’s past demand a response.
“Did she know it before they became involved?”
“I don’t know.”
Leah sounded tired.
“I thought I was helping somebody leave a dangerous house.”
“You acted on what you were told.”
“I should have asked more questions.”
“Not every frightened person can give you proof,” Andrew said.
“That’s why this is so awful.”
When the call ended, Andrew went to the balcony.
A couple on the tennis court argued about whether a ball had touched the line, then laughed and started the next point.
He watched them for a long time because they seemed to live in a world where the truth could still be decided by something both people had seen.
CHAPTER FIVE — THE THIRD PERSON
Hannah appeared outside Andrew’s room just after seven that evening.
She had changed into a loose linen dress and was carrying the sunhat he had seen by the pool.
He spoke through the closed door.
“I won’t talk with you here.”
“Andrew, it’s me.”
“I know.
”
“I need ten minutes.”
“Meet me in the lobby where other people are present.”
She was silent for a beat.
“Do you really think I’d hurt you?”
“I’m not making a claim about what you’d do.”
He rested his forehead against the doorframe.
“I’m trying to make sure nobody leaves another conversation with a different story.”
They met near the entrance to a closed conference room.
A pianist played softly in the adjoining bar, and bellhops rolled suitcases over tile.
Andrew chose chairs beneath a camera but did not point it out.
“Tell me why you said I was violent,
” he asked.
Hannah twisted the brim of her hat.
“It started smaller than that.”
“Where did it start?”
“I told Ethan you and I were drifting apart.”
“We were having problems.”
“Then he asked why I didn’t leave.”
“And you couldn’t say you wanted both of us.”
Her eyes filled.
“I didn’t know how to tell him I wasn’t ready.”
“You could have stopped seeing him.”
“I know.”
“Or told him you were married and hadn’t asked for a divorce.”
“I know.”
She exhaled unevenly.
“He said he’d never stay involved with someone who was cheating.”
Andrew leaned back.
“So you made him believe you weren’t choosing to cheat.
”
Hannah did not deny it.
“I said you would make leaving difficult.”
“Then you described things I never did.”
“It grew.”
“Lies don’t grow by themselves.”
A passing waiter glanced at them and continued into the dining room.
Hannah covered her face.
“I was afraid he’d leave me.”
“And how did you think I’d feel when you told people I beat you?”
She looked at her knees.
“I didn’t think you would find out.”
There it was, the first simple sentence she had spoken that evening.
Andrew felt it land harder than the sight at the swimming pool.
“Who else have you told?”
She hesitated.
“My friend Priya.”
“Anyone at work?”
“One person.”
“Who?”
“My supervisor, Amanda.”
Andrew remembered meeting Amanda at Hannah’s company picnic and telling her about his work restoring old theater seats.
“Why did your supervisor need to know?”
“I missed a deadline, and I said things were difficult at home.”
“Did you claim I threatened you?”
“I said I couldn’t work evenings because I needed to avoid arguments.”
“You worked three evenings last week.”
Hannah looked away.
“Those were with Ethan.”
Andrew stood, then sat again because he didn’t trust his knees.
“I need you to give me a truthful account of what you said to each person.
”
“Are you building a case against me?”
“I’m trying to learn what other people might believe I did.”
“Will you forgive me if I do?”
“Don’t trade truth for a promise I can’t give you.”
Hannah stared at him.
For the first time, Andrew saw not a cunning stranger but the same woman who had burned pancakes on their second date and laughed until she cried.
That recognition did not make what she had done less deliberate.
It made the loss feel more complete.
CHAPTER SIX — PRIYA’S VERSION
Priya Sethi was a nurse in Nashville who had known Hannah since college.
Andrew had always liked her bluntness and had never suspected she knew anything troubling about his marriage.
He called the next morning and asked whether she could speak privately.
“I’ve been expecting you,” Priya said.
“Why?”
“Hannah texted me last night.”
“What did she say?”
“That you’d discovered Ethan and were furious.”
Andrew swallowed.
“Did she tell you she said I hurt her?”
Priya went quiet.
“She told me you were controlling.”
“What did she say I did?”
“She said you made it hard for her to see friends.”
Andrew thought of Priya’s birthday dinner in February, when Hannah had insisted she was exhausted and asked him to send apologies.
“Did she ever say I refused to let her visit you?”
“Yes.”
“When?”
“My birthday.”
He shut his eyes.
“She told me she didn’t want to go.”
Priya exhaled sharply.
“I thought you were the reason she wasn’t there.”
“Did you ask me?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Because if somebody tells you they’re afraid of their husband, calling the husband to verify the story can make things worse.”
Andrew understood the answer even though it hurt.
“I wouldn’t have wanted you to do that either if she really needed help.”
Priya’s voice lowered.
“What do you need from me?”
“Don’t decide I’m innocent because you like me.”
“Andrew.”
“I’m serious.”
He looked at the resort carpet beneath his feet.
“Ask Hannah what she said, and then ask her to correct anything she knows was false.”
“I can do that.”
“Has she involved anybody who might take action?”
Priya hesitated.
“She told me she’d booked a consultation with someone who specializes in safe relocations.”
Andrew stiffened.
“When?”
“Last month.”
“Was that Harbor Door?”
“I don’t know.”
Priya lowered her voice.
“Andrew, Hannah asked me whether I would be willing to come to your house as a witness when she collected her things.”
“Did you agree?”
“I said yes.”
“Did she choose a date?”
“Sunday afternoon.”
Andrew looked at the calendar on his phone.
Sunday was the day they were supposed to drive home.
Hannah had apparently planned to return with a witness and move out in a scene built around a danger she had invented.
“Thank you for telling me,” he said.
“I don’t know what I believed anymore.”
“You believed your friend.”
Priya was quiet for several seconds.
“That doesn’t mean I want to be part of a lie.”
After the call, Andrew contacted a local attorney for a consultation about separating safely and clarifying false statements without intimidating the people who had heard them.
The attorney offered a video meeting for the following day.
Andrew did not ask her how to punish Hannah.
He asked how to avoid making a terrible situation worse.
