Tell Me You're Sorry (3 page)

But now he knew the old blade was still sharp.

It was sharp enough to carve a deep crimson slit across his wife's throat.

C
HAPTER
T
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T
he only other person at Boarding Gate 6 in the A Concourse was a skinny, sixty-something Asian janitor with bad posture. He had a miserable look on his face as he swept around the rows of empty seats. His slumped state had probably come from years and years of working that pint-sized broom and the short-handled standing dustpan. He ignored CNN, playing on the TV bracketed near the top of one wall.

Stephanie Coburn figured this was as good a place as any to eat her Thanksgiving dinner.

She had a Frappuccino and a clear plastic container that held a Starbucks Turkey Rustico Panini. The least they could have done was slip a little dish of cranberry sauce in with the sandwich—for the holiday.

Stephanie had spent the last seven hours in and out of airports, surrounded by people and families making their last-minute treks home for Thanksgiving. They were on their way to see loved ones for reunions, lavish meals, and celebrations. Stephanie was on her way to Pocatello—and then to Salt Lake City, where she'd spend the night alone in a room at the Holiday Inn, before starting a reverse route back to Portland in the morning.

In her blue uniform, the pretty, slender, 33-year-old brunette was often mistaken for a flight attendant. But Stephanie was a pilot. It struck her as weird that some people—men and women—still felt squeamish about a female commanding the plane they were on. But it was something she'd learned to shrug off and not take too personally. Stephanie had been chalking up flight hours as a co-pilot for a small regional carrier, Pacific Cascade Skyways. Usually, pilots had to pay their dues, so to speak, for five to ten years before they would be considered by the major airlines. Stephanie was in her sixth year with Pacific Cascade.

She could think of worse airports in her territory to have Thanksgiving dinner alone. Some of them only had vending machines, where stale peanut butter crackers were haute cuisine. So she was way ahead of the game here with her Starbucks delicacies.

With about forty minutes to eat, she settled down in one of the seats, balanced the container on her lap and the Frappuccino on the armrest. She started eating her sandwich. Past the floor-to-ceiling windows, planes slowly taxied by. A mound of dirty slush and snow bordered the wet runway. The sky was gray, promising white-knuckled turbulence for even the most seasoned pilot. She flew a 74-seater Bombardier Q400, and it could get pretty bouncy even with just a few cloud-hurdles. Stephanie knew she was in for a choppy flight to Pocatello.

But that wasn't why she felt the awful pang in her stomach right now.

It was because she suddenly missed her sister, Rebecca—more than ever.

Stephanie put the turkey panini back in the container. Even if she forced another bite of the sandwich, she couldn't have swallowed a thing, because her throat was tightening. She did her damnedest to hold back the tears.

She caught the janitor staring, and turned her face away. She took a few deep breaths and tried to look interested in CNN. It didn't help that over the airport loudspeaker they were playing “Silver Bells”—broken up every few moments by a flight announcement.

Some Thanksgiving,
Stephanie thought. And Christmas promised to be equally pitiful.

After losing someone, the first holidays without them were the worst. Stephanie had learned that at age sixteen when her parents had been killed. She'd survived those first holidays without her mom and dad, because Becky and Scott had taken her in, and she'd still felt like part of a family. She'd had her older sister sharing her grief.

But now she was alone.

It had been almost six months, and she was still trying to understand why Rebecca had killed herself. Stephanie hadn't seen it coming at all. She'd talked to her sister on the phone the day before Rebecca slit her own throat. They'd been laughing and planning Stephanie's visit at the end of June.

Stephanie wound up going to Croton-on-Hudson two weeks ahead of schedule—to bury her sister.

Scott had been devastated. He'd asked her again and again if Rebecca had given her any indication that she was depressed or discontented. “How could she do something like this—and not leave us a note or any kind of explanation?” he'd asked.

In their mutual grief, she'd never felt so close to her brother-in-law. Scott had insisted she stay with them while she was in town for the funeral—even though it meant his mother had to stay at the neighbor's. He'd said CC and Ernie needed their Aunt Steffi. He'd tried to give her several pieces of jewelry that had been in her family. Rebecca kept them in the safe-deposit box at the bank, taking them out only for special occasions. Stephanie had told Scott to keep them there—for CC when she got older. Scott had cried and given her a fierce hug when he'd dropped her off at the airport. It had been the first time she'd ever stayed with her sister's family that Scott had seemed genuinely sorry to see her leave.

That was why what he'd done just a few months later had come as such a shock. When Stephanie had found out, they'd had a huge blowup over the phone and hadn't talked since. Her sister's funeral had been the last time she'd seen Scott and the kids. She kept in touch with CC through e-mails and texts. She'd spoken to Ernie on the phone and sent him a fifty-dollar iTunes gift card on his birthday the month before. But that was about it.

She used to feel so close to them.

Over the airport's music system “Winter Wonderland” was playing
,
and it had started to sleet outside.

Stephanie managed a few more bites of her turkey sandwich, washing it down with some Frappuccino. Then she took her cell phone from her overnight bag.

Scott probably didn't want to talk with her right now, but Stephanie clicked on their home phone number anyway. She had every right to wish her late sister's children a happy Thanksgiving. The phone rang twice before the answering machine clicked on.
“You've reached the Hamners,”
Scott announced on the recorded greeting.
“No one can come to the phone right now, but leave a message and we'll get back to you . . .”

It used to be her sister's voice on that greeting. She ached to hear it again.

Straightening up in the steel-and-vinyl chair, Stephanie waited for the beep. “Hi, you guys,” she said. She hated the little quaver in her voice. “I just wanted to say Happy Thanksgiving. I miss you. I—I'm between flights, calling from the Spokane airport . . .” She looked around the empty gate area. The janitor had wandered off. “Ah, not much going on, just thinking of you, that's all. I hope I'm not interrupting your dinner. I'm not sure when you're having it this year. Anyway, I—”

There was a click on the other end. “Aunt Steffi?”

“CC?”

“Did you get our message?” she asked. “Ernie, Dad, and I—we left you a voice mail on your home line about three hours ago. Happy Thanksgiving . . .”

Stephanie smiled wistfully. At least they'd thought of her. “Happy Thanksgiving, sweetie,” she said. “I haven't checked my messages yet today. I've been flying since Monday, lucky me. In fact, I head off to Pocatello in a few minutes. I didn't interrupt your dinner, did I?”

“No, we already ate.” Her voice dropped to a whisper: “Halle tried to cook a Turducken—you know, a chicken inside a duck inside a turkey? Talk about disgusting. This was along with soggy Stovetop Stuffing and instant mashed potatoes, which she somehow managed to screw up, too. I guess she didn't read the directions right on the Hungry Jack box.”

Stephanie glanced at the remainder of her turkey panini in the container on the seat next to her. Suddenly, she didn't feel so bad.

“I was trying to tell Halle about the stuffing Mom made every Thanksgiving. That was so incredible. What was in it again?”

“Italian sausage and cornbread,” Stephanie said. “I can't imagine Halle wanted to hear about it.”

“Yeah, at just about that time, she kicked my ass out of the kitchen. Anyway, I'm going vegan after this. I really miss Mom's cooking.” Stephanie heard her sigh on the other end of the line. “I miss Mom.”

“You and me both, honey,” Stephanie murmured. “Her culinary expertise aside, how's it working out with your new stepmom?”

There was a silence on the other end. “Okay, I guess,” CC finally replied.

Stephanie had first found out about Halle through CC—in an e-mail, three months after Rebecca's suicide.

Stephanie had wondered the same thing.

She got the story in bits and pieces. Apparently, Halle had come to New York for a job offer that fell through. While out pounding the pavement for work, she'd ducked into the lobby of Scott's office building to ditch some creep who had been following her. She asked Scott if he'd act like they were together. They stood there and talked for a few minutes. That had been the start of it. He'd rescued her.

“Really, I was the one who got rescued,” Scott had maintained when Stephanie had talked to him on the phone about his new girlfriend. “And for the record, CC's got it all blown out of proportion. There's nothing going on. Halle and I are just friends. She's a terrific person—and an incredible help to me right now. . . .”

Scott married her two months later, near the end of October.

Stephanie wasn't invited to the wedding. In fact, no one was. Apparently, CC found out about it when her dad and new stepmother returned from an Atlantic City weekend, and sprung the news on her. “At first, I was really PO'd,” CC wrote in her e-mail to Stephanie. “But I guess if he has to marry someone, it might as well be Halle. She's pretty cool, and lets me do pretty much whatever I want. I really shouldn't bitch & moan. But the way Dad did it was just so sneaky. . . .”

CC's e-mail had come with an attachment: a photo of Scott with his bride. Decked out in a wraparound purple dress that clung to her shapely figure, she nuzzled up beside Scott. Arms entwined, they posed on a balcony overlooking the beach, and she gazed up at him with a dreamy smile. But her face—in profile—was partially obscured by her windblown flaxen hair.

Bimbo,
Stephanie thought, reviewing the photo and wishing she had a clearer image of her sister's replacement.

She was furious with Scott. Her sister had been dead less than five months, and he'd already gotten married again—to someone she'd never even met. It had to be one of the shortest grieving periods on record. He barely knew this Halle woman, for God's sake.

“Well, of course, you disapprove,” Scott had grumbled when she'd once again grilled him on the phone—this time about his fast-track marriage. “You think no woman is good enough to replace Rebecca. But just ask the kids about Halle. They adore her. I'd like you to meet her. But first, you need to be on board with this, Steffi. I mean, if you can't be supportive—well, you're still family and we all love you. But you're so judgmental. . .”

“You know something, Scott? You're a real asshole.”

The conversation—their last—had gone downhill from there.

Again, Stephanie had relied on her niece to fill in the blanks. Why had he been in such a hurry to marry her? “Beats me,” CC had told her on the phone a few weeks back. “Something to do with Halle getting a job offer in Philadelphia, and Dad didn't want to lose her . . .”

But he didn't seem to mind losing his sister-in-law. Stephanie couldn't help feeling as if she and her sister were no longer part of his life. CC and Ernie were her only family, her last link to her sister. Now those kids had a new stepmother.

Part of Stephanie rejoiced knowing the woman couldn't cook worth shit and they'd all had a lousy Thanksgiving. Another part of her felt sorry for them. She watched the frozen rain slash at the gate area's floor-to-ceiling windows and listened to the misery in CC's voice.

“Does your dad seem happy?” she asked.

“I guess so, I don't know,” CC replied. “Why don't you ask him?
HEY, DAD!
”

“Oh, no, listen, don't bother him—”

“He wants to talk to you,” CC said. “He told me to call him when we finished. He's right here. I miss you, Aunt Steffi. Happy Turkey Day. Fly safe.”

“Thanks, honey,” she said. She heard some murmuring on the other end.

“Close the door, will ya, CC?” Scott said, his voice a bit muffled. There was a beat, and then he came in loud and clear: “Steffi?”

“Hi, Scott,” she said, trying to sound pleasant. “Happy Thanksgiving.”

“From what I heard on the answering machine before CC grabbed the phone, I gather you're in the airport between flights. Can't be much of a holiday for you, huh?”

“No, not much,” she admitted. She thought he sounded a bit drunk. Scott always took on a nasally tone whenever he'd had a few drinks.

“Listen, Steffi,” he whispered. “I feel crappy about the last time we talked. You had every reason to be pissed off at me. In fact, go ahead with the ‘I told you so.' I have it coming. You were right, you know. I shouldn't have married so soon after . . .”

He fell silent for a moment. Maybe he expected her to say something.

“Don't get me wrong,” he continued. “Halle's wonderful. But it's been a challenge. I constantly test her patience, because I still miss Rebecca. I miss her something fierce. It's crazy, I know. Anyway, go ahead and say, ‘I told you so.' ”