Perfect Storm

18- Tawny

"So, how are you?" Hannah asked as I lifted the trash out of the garbage can.

I shrugged a shoulder. "I'm all right. Considering..."

"I've meant to talk to you all week, but I've been a bit busy doing my end, not wanting Ian on my ass," she softly giggled, sounding a little nervous. "It also didn't help my boyfriend had taken time off work to spend it here with me."

"It's okay. I understand," I said, walking over and throwing the bag in the back of the trailer hooked to the golf cart. "You've got a life too."

"You're not upset with me, are you?"

I turned around, shaking my head. "No. Why would I be upset with you?"

Her lips twisted, and then her cheeks turned flushed. "Well, because of Ian and how he talked me into telling him about what happened to your mother."

I waved my hand across my face. "No big deal. Eventually, Ian would have gotten it out of me."

"Yeah, but that was your business to tell if you wanted him to know, not mine..."

My lips pulled to the side, giving her an assuring smirk. "Hannah, it's okay. Really... I know how Ian is, and I'm sure he was pressuring you into telling him."

"He did do that. But I should have stuck to my guns and said nothing."

I walked over and wrapped my arms around her, hugging her. "Stop beating yourself up over nothing. I never said not to tell Ian. At the time, I just didn't want him to know anything about me when I mentioned it to you. Now that he and I are good, I'm okay with him knowing."

"Yeah, but you still didn't tell him when he asked about it."

I stepped back, sighing. "I wanted to tell Ian, but after having a good night and morning with him, I didn't want to dampen the mood. The mood got drenched anyway because of my father. So now that he knows what I've been through, maybe, just maybe, his mood around here with me will change."

Hannah laughed. "Are you kidding me right now? That man's mood has been different ever since he dropped you off. Hell, he hasn't even been around all week. What did you say to him that got him not to hang around as he has been?"

She probably already knows about Ian and me, but before I go blabbing my mouth, I better see what she knows first.

"Besides Ian talking to about my father. What else did the two of you talk about?"

"He told me what happened with your father and that if you decided you needed time off to be with him, to grant you as much time off as you wish to have. That's pretty much all he had to say, really."

"That's all?" I asked, surprised.

She walked over, grabbed a bag from the back of the golf cart, and handed it to me. "Ian did tell me that you two had a good night, that you guys talked about your differences, and that all is good now between you two. When I asked what that meant, excitement rushed through me when he said that you were willing to allow him to show that he's a better man than what he's shown you these last couple of years," she admitted, her mouth curving into a big smile. "So, because of his mood change and how he's been staying away, I'm as curious as ever."

"About?" I asked, trying to hold back the smile my mouth was itching to form into.

"Are you and Ian officially a couple?"

"We did talk and clear up some of our issues, not all of them, but enough to allow him to beg that I give him a chance to prove he's not this monster he's portrayed himself to be. So, I guess you could say we are giving a relationship a shot."