So it's been weeks, and I'm sorry, but I had a lot to do and I'm really busy these days, so unfortunately I won't be able to update as often as I used to. Thanks for your patience. :)
Chapter Four.
Allison felt like she couldn't breathe. She almost felt like she was having a panic attack, but she took a deep breath and said, "Hannah Benoit?"
Lee nodded, "Do you know a Hannah Benoit?"
Allison nodded, "And you do too. Hannah Benoit is my niece."
Lee looked surprised, "Are you serious, Allison?"
Allison practically glared at him, "You think I would joke about this?!"
"No, no, of course not." Lee shook his head hastily.
"Allison, where's your niece right now?" Devalos asked, looking at Allison seriously.
Allison had to think about it for a few moments and then said, "She's at home with the girls."
"Well, you might want to call her." Lee said. "Make sure she doesn't go anywhere, or open the door to anyone unless it's us."
"Us?" Allison repeated, raising her eyebrows.
"You and I are going to talk to Hannah about her protection."
"Wait, Lee… what?" Allison looked confused.
"We're obviously going to put her in police protection," Lee said, pulling on his coat, "We're not just going to let her walk out there when a serial killer is looking for girls who fit her profile perfectly. Until a team is assembled, I'll look after her."
Allison almost smiled at Lee, "Thank you."
"Girls, Mommy's home!!" Allison called as she and Lee entered the house.
"Hi, Mommy!" Bridget and Marie came skipping from where they were seated on the couch to the entryway.
Ariel waved without getting up, but she looked a little bit confused when she spotted Detective Scanlon.
"Ariel, where's Hannah?" Allison asked, looking around expectantly.
"Hannah's in the shower," Ariel responded. "Hi, Detective Scanlon."
"Hi, Ariel, girls." Lee nodded at them.
Allison looked at Lee and then said, "I'll go see if Hannah's almost finished."
"Is Hannah in trouble?" Ariel asked automatically.
Allison shook her head, "No, honey, Hannah isn't in trouble."
Allison walked down the hallway to the bathroom and knocked on the door, before opening the door a crack, "Hannah? It's Aunt Allison,"
"Aunt Allison?" Allison heard the shower curtain rustling and Allison stuck her head in and found Hannah, sticking her head out of the shower, with her hair drenched and water dripping off her. "I thought you had work today?"
"I did," Allison let out a slow breath, "Honey, can you come out? I'd like to talk to you about something."
"Sure thing." Hannah sounded a little bit confused, but as Allison closed the door, she heard Hannah turning off the water.
Not even five minutes later, Hannah was sitting in front of Lee and Allison. Her dark hair was soaked and hanging down her back, and she was wearing a baby blue housecoat that was a couple sizes too big for her, but was pulled tightly around her, as she looked at the two in front of her with apprehensive blue eyes.
"What's going on, Mom?" Ariel asked, obviously confused by the fact that Detective Scanlon was in their home.
"Nothing, Ariel. Detective Scanlon and I just need to talk to Hannah about something… can you take your sisters and watch Hannah Montana or something with them?"
"Sure…" Ariel looked quite unsure actually, but she nodded and ushered Marie and Bridget into the room she shared with Hannah.
Once the three younger girls were gone, Hannah looked at them, "What's going on?"
Allison looked at her beautiful niece, and held back the urge to start crying. "Hannah, honey, we have something to tell you, and it's not going to be easy to take… not at all."
"All right?" Hannah looked confused.
"Ms. Benoit," Lee began, taking a deep breath, "We have reason to believe that a serial killer is intending to make you his next victim."
Way to beat around the bush, Lee. Allison thought. She looked at Hannah, and watched her niece's dark eyebrows shoot up her pale forehead in surprise.
"What?"
Lee nodded, "We've discovered the bodies of seven girls between the ages of nineteen and twenty-two, with your basic build and features, who have all been murdered in a similar fashion, and all attended University of Phoenix."
Hannah looked at Allison, "That's why you wanted to know what UPX was." Allison nodded and she looked at Lee, "How do you know I'm the next girl that's going to be killed? There are lots of girls at UPX who look like me."
"We've discovered the way he chooses his victims," Lee explained, "He chooses the girls alphabetically. He goes through the list of girls attending UPX, and finds the first one who has brown or black hair and blue eyes." He looked at Hannah seriously, "You're the next one on the list, Ms. Benoit."
"We understand if you're scared, honey." Allison said, "But everything's going to be okay. Detective Scanlon is going to protect you."
Hannah looked at Lee and blinked, "How?"
"I'll be escorting you to your classes, there's always going to be an officer here, at the house, even while you're in class, and you're not to go anywhere by yourself." Lee said, "And I'm going to need you to be completely honest with me, Ms. Benoit. I know it may seem like an invasion of privacy, but if you get any phone calls, text messages, e-mails, anything that makes you question what the sender is trying to say, you're going to have to let me know." He looked at her, "Can you do that?"
Hannah nodded slowly and then said, "Yeah. I can do that."
Allison raised her eyebrows, "That's all you have to say?"
Hannah nodded again, "What else am I supposed to say?"
Allison pursed her lips before shaking her head, "Nothing, honey… nothing." She reached out a hand and stroked her niece's dark hair, "When's your first class today?"
"In about an hour," Hannah responded.
"Go get ready then." Allison nodded, "Just come and say when you're ready, and then you and Lee can go."
Hannah nodded for a third time, and stood up, walking to the bathroom.
"She took that really well," Lee said, looking confused.
"That's what you think." Allison said, "That's just Hannah, though. You give her something earth-shattering, life-changing, and she just absorbs it like it's nothing, or that's what it looks like. But my Hannah is incredibly gifted at concealing her emotions," Allison said, "That's just the way she became."
"No way." Ariel looked as though she couldn't believe a single word coming from her older cousin's mouth. Her blue eyes were wide, and her mouth was hanging open slightly.
"Way." Hannah nodded, blowing her dark hair dry with the hair dryer.
"Wow." Ariel let out a soft sigh, "I guess the Benoit side of the family just attracts trouble, like Mom says."
Hannah chuckled lightly, "I think we must. The women Benoit's at least."
Ariel looked at Hannah and said, "Aren't you scared, Hannah?"
Hannah shook her head, "Ariel, I've got a psychic aunt, and the cops protecting me, plus," She added as an afterthought, "I've had crazy ex-boyfriends, so I'm pretty much a pro at avoiding psychopaths."
Ariel smiled weakly and then said seriously, "I'm scared."
"Don't be." Her cousin looked at her seriously, and put two hands on Ariel's shoulders, looking her straight in the eyes, "Ariel, don't be scared for me, or for yourself, for a second, okay? Detective Scanlon is gonna protect me, and there's gonna be another police officer at the house, all the time, even when I'm not here." Hannah pulled Ariel into a hug, "You're gonna be safe, and nothing's gonna happen to me."
"Promise?" Ariel sounded as though she was four, instead of fourteen.
Hannah nodded, "I promise." She released Ariel and continued to get ready for class, pulling her long hair into a ponytail, "Now, don't you breathe a word of this to Bridget or Marie."
Ariel shook her head, "I won't. I promise."
"Good girl." Hannah smiled, "Now, I've gotta go, but when I get home, we can catch up, okay?"
Ariel nodded, "Okay, bye, Hannah."
Hannah walked out of the bathroom and grabbed her purse as she made her way to the kitchen. She found Lee and Allison talking in hushed voices, but the both stopped when they spotted Hannah.
"I'm ready to go."
"All right," Lee and Allison said in unison.
Lee looked at Hannah, "We'll be taking your car, Ms. Benoit, it would be a bit less conspicuous than us showing up in a squad car."
Hannah nodded to show she understood, right before she was pulled into a hug by her aunt.
"Be safe, okay? Promise me, you'll be safe, Hannah." Allison said seriously.
"I promise." Hannah nodded, "Honest, Aunt Allison, I only have one class this afternoon, how much trouble can I get into?"
"You're a Benoit, aren't you?" Allison smiled, before reaching up to kiss Hannah's cheek, "I'll see you two for supper."
Hannah and Lee made their way out to the car, and Hannah noted that Lee looked as though he was going to protest when Hannah hopped into the driver's seat.
Once he was in the passengers seat, Hannah looked at him, "Detective Scanlon, I might be getting stalked by a psychopath, but I'm pretty sure that I'm capable of driving my own car."
"I didn't say anything."
"I could tell from the look on your face," Hannah replied, as she backed the bright blue Mini Cooper out of the driveway.
"Oh." Lee nodded slowly.
They sat in silence for a few moments, until Lee gave her a strange look, "Is this Guns'N'Roses?"
Hannah nodded, "November Rain. One of my all-time favorite tunes… you can skip around on the CD, there's all kinds of stuff on it, if you're not into Guns'N'Roses."
"No, no." Lee shook his head, "I love this song, I just find it kind of weird that you like it too."
"What makes you say that?"
"You're a little bit young to be into hair bands and this music, aren't you?" Lee asked, as Satisfaction by the Rolling Stones started playing.
Hannah shrugged, "I'm gonna be twenty-two soon… but this is the sort of stuff I listened to when I was growing up. My mom wasn't really a… conventional mother, let's say, so the way she brought me up, definitely influenced my taste in music."
Lee nodded slowly and watched her drive for a little while before Hannah said, "So, did you always want to be a cop, Detective Scanlon?"
"I think, since we're going to be spending a fair bit of time together, you can call me Lee." Lee said.
"Only if you call me Hannah, and drop that Ms. Benoit crap." Hannah replied.
"Sounds fair." Lee nodded, smiling slightly, "And no, not always. At one point in time, I wanted to be a doctor… well, at least that's what my parents had me convinced I wanted to be."
"What stopped you, being a doctor not glamorous enough?" Hannah asked, looking at him out of the corner of her eye.
"I didn't like it." Lee admitted, wondering why he felt like he could talk so freely around Hannah, and feeling slightly strange because he could.
"Oh," Hannah nodded, "That makes a lot of sense."
They were in silence once again, and they stayed this way until they pulled into the parking lot at University of Phoenix.
They were in silence until they almost reached the building they were going to enter.
"What class do you have?" Lee asked, looking at her.
"Visual Arts," Hannah responded, and then smiled slightly, "And I know exactly how I'm gonna explain why I have you."
"You could just tell them I'm a cop." Lee said, slightly concerned about the smile on her face.
"Yeah, and how do I explain why you're there?" Hannah raised her eyebrows.
Lee was silent and Hannah nodded, "Exactly. My explanation is gonna work. Just you wait and see."
Hannah was right, Lee discovered, as they walked into her classroom, and a tall woman with bright red hair came towards them, "Ms. Benoit, would you like to explain your guest?"
"He's my prop." Hannah replied, which caused Lee's eyebrows to shoot up his forehead.
"Ah." The redhead nodded, "Well, Ms. Benoit's prop, I'm Professor Everett."
"Detective Lee Scanlon."
"A detective?" Professor Everett looked impressed, "I had no idea Hannah had such impressive relatives."
"Well, we're not relatives and being a detective isn't really all that impressive…" Lee said, chuckling a little.
"Of course, it is."
"Not as impressive as being a teacher, Professor."
"Oh, please, call me Lena."
Hannah cleared her throat and it took Lee a few moments to realize she was frowning deeply.
"Oh." Professor Everett nodded, "Well, you may begin, Ms. Benoit."
"Come on," Hannah led Lee over to the corner and sat down at a table, "You sit here." She pointed.
Lee looked slightly offended at being told what to do, but sat down across from her.
Hannah didn't say anything as she pulled her things out of her bag, and Lee said, "Were you jealous?"
"What?" Hannah looked up, "I don't know what you're talking about, Detective."
"Well, no offence, Ms. Benoit, but you're kind of acting like you were jealous."
"Well, I wasn't." Hannah stated, "It's in your head."
"Uh-huh." Lee nodded and then, looking rather amused, said, "I'm your prop?"
"Oh, get your mind out of the gutter, Scanlon." Hannah said, rolling her blue eyes, "I'm gonna draw you."
"Huh?"
"Visual Arts." Hannah spoke slowly as though she was speaking to a child, "You do are that is visual, such as drawing someone."
Lee frowned slightly, but nodded.
Hannah started sketching slowly, and Lee said, "So, you know about your aunt's gift?"
Hannah nodded, "Yeah. My mom had pretty much the same thing, which was probably why she turned out to be such a whack job." She lifted her eyes for only a moment before returning to the page.
Lee was about to ask her what she meant, when he decided they definitely weren't close enough for him to ask yet, so he said, "And you?"
"What about me?"
"Do you have any… special talents?"
Hannah smiled faintly, "I have certain… abilities, yeah."
"Care to share?" Lee asked.
Hannah flipped to a page in her sketchbook and handed it to him.
Lee was a little stunned. It was a perfect drawing of a crime scene he'd been at the week before, and pictures hadn't been released to the press…
"I drew it from memory." Hannah said, as though reading his mind, watching his face, "I had a dream about it, and I drew it."
"Wow." Lee said before he could stop himself. "This is amazing."
Hannah shrugged, "It's nothing… oh, and sometimes I can channel spirits."
Lee nodded slowly and a few moments later, Hannah said, "Do you ever smile?"
"I smile."
"Yeah, when?" Hannah raised her eyebrows, "You don't look like the kind of person who smiles."
"Well, I do." Lee stated.
"I'm sure," Hannah rolled her eyes, before returning to her drawing. Lee found himself almost smiling a real smile. He wasn't quite sure why, but he had a pretty good idea that it had something to do with a certain Benoit.
There you go, a nice long chapter to make up for the fact that I haven't updated in almost a month. Please read and review!
