Chapter 12 - The Woman From ItalyThree days later, Sloan Mercer walked into Hannah’s hospital.
Hannah did not recognize her immediately.
She was reviewing medication reconciliation charts at the nurses’ station when a woman in a camel coat stopped several feet away.
“Hannah.”
The voice made her look up.
Sloan appeared different from the photographs.
Less polished.
More human.
Her hair was pulled into a simple ponytail. No dramatic makeup. No designer luggage. No champagne smile beside Grant.
Hannah’s body reacted before her mind did.
Her heart accelerated.
Her palms went cold.
For one violent second, she was back at the marble kitchen island.
The reservation.
The message.
Maybe this time you’ll have the right woman beside you.
Hannah closed the chart.
“What are you doing here?”
“I need five minutes.”
“No.”
Sloan swallowed.
“I understand.”
She turned.
That should have been the end.
But Hannah surprised herself.
“Wait.”
Sloan stopped.
Hannah led her into an empty family consultation room.
She remained standing.
“You have five minutes.”
Sloan nodded.
“I owe you an apology.”
Hannah almost laughed.
“You crossed two hundred miles for that?”
“No.”
Sloan reached into her handbag.
“I came because somebody contacted me.”
She placed a photograph on the table.
Grant.
Leaving Hannah’s farmhouse.
The image had clearly been taken from a distance.
Hannah’s stomach tightened.
“When?”
“Two weeks ago.”
“Who sent it?”
“Anonymous number.”
Sloan placed her phone beside it.
There were six messages.
You lost him because of her.
Whitmore is weak now.
Help us fix that.
We know where the baby sleeps.
Hannah stopped breathing.
Her eyes locked on the final sentence.
Sloan spoke quickly.
“I called Grant’s corporate security office. They refused to connect me directly because he apparently gave instructions that I’m never to be put through to him.”
Despite everything, Hannah almost smiled.
“So I came to you.”
“Why?”
Sloan’s eyes lowered.
“Because whatever I did to you, I will not be responsible for something happening to your child.”
Hannah studied her.
There was shame there.
Real shame.
Not enough to erase the past.
But enough to recognize.
“Did you respond?”
“No.”
“Does anyone know you came here?”
“I don’t think so.”
Hannah immediately called Grant.
He answered before the second ring.
“Hannah?”
His voice always changed when she called.
“What happened?”
“I need you at the hospital.”
Silence.
Then:
“Are you hurt?”
“No.”
“Leo?”
“He’s fine.”
Grant exhaled.
“I’m coming.”
He arrived eighteen minutes later.
Daniel happened to be walking with him.
Grant entered the consultation room first.
Then stopped dead.
Sloan stood beside the window.
The temperature seemed to drop ten degrees.
“What is she doing here?”
Sloan crossed her arms.
“Lovely to see you too.”
Grant ignored her and looked at Hannah.
“Did she bother you?”
“No.”
“Hannah—”
“She came to warn us.”
Hannah showed him the messages.
Grant’s face changed.
Not dramatically.
That was what frightened Hannah.
His expression emptied.
The gentleness disappeared.
The old Grant surfaced.
“Who sent these?”
“I don’t know,” Sloan said.
Grant pulled out his phone.
“Marcus. Lock down Hannah’s farmhouse. Quietly. Nobody frightens her parents or Leo. I want every camera between the county road and the property checked for the last thirty days.”
Hannah touched his wrist.
Grant stopped speaking.
“Look at me.”
He did.
“You promised.”
His jaw tightened.
“I promised not to control your life.”
“You also promised our son would not grow up surrounded by your world.”
“This is different.”
“No. This is exactly when promises matter.”
Grant looked at the threatening message again.
We know where the baby sleeps.
Something terrifying moved through his eyes.
Hannah understood.
He was afraid.
Not angry.
Afraid.
Grant Whitmore had once solved fear by becoming more frightening than whatever threatened him.
Now he was being asked to solve it differently.
He lowered the phone.
“What do you want me to do?”
Sloan stared at him.
Daniel stared at him.
Hannah did too.
Eight months earlier, Grant would never have asked that question.
Hannah answered carefully.
“Police. Hospital security. Your lawyers. Legitimate investigators. Nothing illegal.”
Grant’s mouth tightened.
“That limits several efficient options.”
“Grant.”
“I’m joking.”
“You’re absolutely not.”
“Mostly joking.”
Even Sloan nearly smiled.
Grant called his attorney instead.
Within an hour, state investigators had copies of the messages.
Hospital security reviewed cameras.
Grant did not threaten anyone.
He did not break anyone’s fingers.
He did not dispatch men into the night.
It might have been the most difficult afternoon of his life.
That evening, Sloan prepared to leave.
Hannah walked her to the entrance.
Sloan paused.
“For what it’s worth, he never loved me.”
Hannah said nothing.
“I knew before Italy,” Sloan continued. “I just didn’t want to admit it.”
“That doesn’t make what happened better.”
“I know.”
Sloan looked through the glass doors.
Grant was outside beside Hannah’s car, checking Leo’s infant seat installation for the third time.
“He talked about you constantly.”
Hannah frowned.
“He told me his marriage was dead.”
“He did. Then he spent every dinner complaining that I ordered wine incorrectly because Hannah would have chosen something better. That I folded clothes wrong because Hannah rolled his shirts when traveling. That I didn’t know his mother’s birthday.”
Sloan gave a bitter laugh.
“I was having an affair with a man who somehow managed to make his wife the third person at every table.”
Hannah looked away.
Sloan stepped through the doors.
Then she stopped.
“One more thing.”
“What?”
“The person sending those messages knew about Italy.”
Hannah’s eyes sharpened.
“Lots of people could know.”
“No.”
Sloan shook her head.
“They knew something nobody outside Grant’s inner circle should know.”
She handed Hannah the phone again.
A seventh message had arrived.
This time there was a photograph attached.
Grant and Sloan.
On the terrace in Positano.
Taken from inside the suite.
Hannah’s blood turned cold.
May you like
Because whoever wanted to hurt Grant had not started watching him after he returned home.
They had been close enough to watch him all along.
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