She felt the pressure of the point as if it were happening to someone else.
Hannah suddenly stood and grabbed a towel. She dried off and put her robe on, then made her way to the kitchen, glass in hand. She poured herself another drink and turned on the TV mounted on the kitchen counter. She blindly grabbed a book and took it with her to the couch. She went over to the couch, the noise of the TV a comforting distraction behind her and began reading until her head nodded forward and she fell asleep.
Deep in the shadows, Neeley hadn't moved. Neeley considered options, but then realized there weren't many courses open to her.
Neeley took one final look at Hannah asleep on the couch. Neeley felt reasonably confident Hannah wouldn't be doing anything else tonight. There was no guarantee of that, but she couldn't stay here forever just watching. She doubted very much that John Masterson would show up in the middle of the night. She could think while she moved.
Neeley slid the field-glasses into the backpack and threw it over her shoulders. She moved through the darkened woods, heading back for the truck, not needing the GPR to find her way back. After fifteen minutes, Neeley came to the parking lot. Before leaving the shadows, she scanned the street and the other lots. There were no other vehicles that looked like surveillance. There was no reason why there should be, but Neeley never took chances.
Neeley drove without thinking. She pulled the pickup into the underground garage at the hotel and parked. She took the elevator up to the second floor and went into her room, leaving the lights off. Always the second floor — low enough to be able to get out the window, but not the first floor where it would be easy for someone to get in the window.
Pushing the bed aside, Neeley stripped and stood in front of the large mirror that topped the dresser. Slowly she started stretching, working from her neck down. After years of intense work, she could finally do a complete split of her legs to the sides and, after a few minutes, she got down all the way. There, spread on the floor, she bent over and pushed her hamstrings even further, touching her forehead to her knees. The strain on the muscles felt good.
Satisfied she was loose, Neeley stood back up, faced the mirror and began the first Kata. Low block left. Sliding step combined with middle punch. Reverse. Low block right. Sliding step with middle punch. Ninety degrees left. Middle block left flowing into a snap kick to the face. Middle punch. The first Kata was 48 movements and took her almost a minute.
Neeley liked the discipline of the Katas, the formalized movements required of martial arts students. She enjoyed watching herself in the mirror. Her muscles rippled and flowed as she blocked, punched, chopped and kicked. The only thing lacking was an opponent. She moved without a noise. Even the required jump kicks were deadly silent on the room's carpet.
Kata's one through eight, those required of the level one black belt, took almost ten minutes. Neeley repeated the cycle ten times: eighty complex mini-dances. By the end, the sweat was pouring off her. As Neeley finished the tenth number eight she draw her fists together in front of her eyes and slowly brought them down together in front to her waist. Feet shoulder width apart, she stood that way for a long minute, arm and chest muscles vibrating from the pressure she was exerting on the fists.
A vision of Gant passed across her eyes and was reflected in the mirror. The discipline of the art slid away. In one fluid movement she slid her right leg back, reached across her chest with her left fist and then pulled back with that same fist towards her side as her right fist flashed forward towards the mirror, push-pull, the essence of power. Some remnant of sanity stopped her fist a scant inch from the flat surface of the mirror and the projected image of Gant.
Neeley shivered as she realized what she had almost done. The ridges of muscle across her stomach and chest relaxed as she took a deep breath. Neeley turned to the bed and collapsed across it.
CHAPTER 7
Hannah groggily put her arm over her eyes to shield them from the bright morning sun. She rolled away from the huge palladium windows that allowed the unfiltered light to blaze through their high arches. John's windows, she thought. Those two windows had probably cost more than the first house she was sent to in Kansas. She raised her head from the pillow to check the time and was hit with a tremendous wracking pain that told her she had once again drank too much.
She tried to think of a good reason to get off the sofa and had just about decided there wasn't one when the phone rang. She reached across and grabbed the phone. "Hello," she croaked in a voice husky enough to cause concern.
"Hannah Masterson?" a female voice tentatively inquired.
"Yes?"
"I'm just confirming your appointment today with Doctor Jenkins."
"Jenkins," Hannah repeated. "Oh, yeah, right. I'll be there."
"See you at eleven." The phone went dead. Jenkins. Hannah had been seeing him intermittingly for about five years. She’d gone the first time at John’s insistence after the miscarriage. She wasn’t sure the psychiatrist was doing her much good but Howard’s urging had spurred her to make the appointment and she figured now that she was locked in, she might as well go, considering she’d be charged whether she were there or not.
Hannah put her feet on the ground. She looked around the room, remembering the time she had painted the walls, when her greatest concern had been making sure the paint color matched the curtains.
The doorbell echoed through the empty house. Hannah threw on a robe and staggered to the front door.
Amelia Lewis looked surprised for only a moment, and then she walked through the open door and set down a folder on the foyer table. Hannah searched her muddled mind for the proper role.
"I have the information you need for the fund-raiser," Amelia said.
Hannah looked at the folder. "I'm sorry Amelia but I thought—"
Amelia held up a hand. "Listen, Hannah, I know something's going on. But there's no need for you to bury your head in the sand. If you don't want to talk about it, that's your business, but remember, I am here for you. I don't think you should just chuck everything."
Hannah bit back the insane laughter that welled in her chest. “I didn’t chuck everything, Amelia.”
Hannah could almost hear the synapses connecting in the other woman's head. Amelia fidgeted, looking very uncomfortable and concerned.
"Well, come in," Hannah said, more to get her out of the foyer and view of the street than anything else. She led Amelia to the kitchen. "Care for a drink?"
There was a part of her that took pleasure from the shocked look Amelia’s face.
"Hannah, what’s going on?”
“Oh, come off it,” Hannah said as she poured herself a glass full of scotch. “I’m sure Celia has filled everyone in.”
Amelia’s face tightened slightly. “John really left you?”
“’Left me’?” Hannah repeated.
"You shouldn't blame yourself for what happened, Hannah."
“Oh, that’s good,” Hannah said. “I’m not blaming me for John. I’m blaming me for me.” She saw the lack of comprehension on Amelia’s face and knew they were so far apart now, in just a few short days, that they could never really talk again. There was no common ground for understanding.
Hannah knew deep in her heart that there had never been any to start with. She was here because of John. None of these other women had been raised as wards of the state, moving from foster home to foster home, seen the things she’d seen at such a young age. She had tried so hard to pretend but ultimately she had failed at this life. She didn’t know yet how she had, but there was no doubting now that she had. Staring at Amelia, Hannah felt something shift inside of herself. The pretend Hannah was dead — the thing she wasn’t sure of, was who was the real Hannah?