Chapter 3 - HANNAH HAD NEVER STOLEN ANYTHING
Evelyn found Hannah through an old Christmas card.
The number still worked.
Hannah answered cautiously.
“Mrs. Whitmore?”
“It’s Evelyn.”
Silence.
Then:
“Is Maisie okay?”
Exactly like that.
No questions about Grant.
No anger over the firing.
Maisie.
Evelyn closed her eyes.
“I need to know why you left.”
Another long pause.
“Grant told you I stole from him.”
“Yes.”
“I didn’t.”
Hannah had never been formally accused.
No police report.
No insurance claim.
No demand for repayment.
Grant simply told family and friends that several hundred dollars went missing and Hannah could no longer be trusted.
Hannah’s actual departure began with something else.
Maisie had started having severe bedtime anxiety.
Whenever Grant worked late, Maisie clung to Hannah.
One evening Grant came home and found Maisie asleep against the nanny’s shoulder.
He became furious.
Not because of anything inappropriate.
Because Maisie had cried when Hannah tried to hand her to him.
“She wanted me.”
Hannah’s voice broke.
“And Grant hated it.”
The next week he changed Hannah’s schedule.
Reduced her hours.
Told her to stop hugging Maisie during tantrums.
Then he created a rule.
If Maisie cried for Hannah after Hannah left, Hannah was not allowed to visit the next day.
“He called it breaking dependency.”
Evelyn’s stomach tightened.
“What happened the last night?”
Hannah hesitated.
“I found Maisie sitting outside her bedroom.”
“Outside?”
“Grant had taken the doorknob off the inside because she kept coming out asking for me.”
Evelyn stood.
“You saw that?”
“Yes.”
“I told Vanessa.”
Evelyn went completely still.
Vanessa had known.
“What did she do?”
“She begged me not to confront him until she figured out what to do.”
“And then?”
“Two days later Grant accused me of stealing.”
There was no mystery anymore about who Vanessa meant by “the last person.”
May you like
But there was still a worse question.
If Vanessa knew six months ago, why had she stayed?
