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Summary: Chapters 31–33
Chapter 31: When We Were Young
Hannah and Grady tensely discuss Hannah’s “mess” in the US Marshals’ office while deputies search for Bailey. He blames her for coming to Austin, while she asserts his reticence to share information gave her little choice. In partial acknowledgement of the truth of her claim, Grady admits that Owen was not officially in witness protection, as he did not trust the government to protect Bailey should their protected identities be compromised. Like Hannah, then, he took matters into his own hands, with some assistance from Grady, who helped him to disappear unofficially. The men remained in touch over the years, and Grady admits that he had advised Owen to neither pursue Hannah nor share his “real” identity with her. Owen accepted the latter advice. According to Grady, Owen likely ran to avoid the exposure that his inevitable arrest by the FBI would bring. He offers no proof, but indicates that Avett may well have used Owen’s secret as leverage over his talented employee and that Owen was still working to correct the damage done by The Shop. Owen’s awareness that it would devastate Bailey to start over, and that Hannah would have to give up her beloved work, justifies her faith in him.
Hannah does not agree with Grady’s conclusion that their situation demands that they enter witness protection immediately. Because Hannah balks at the idea since Bailey would thus lose everything, he baldly explains that Nicholas’s associates are cruel enough to hurt or kill Bailey to punish Owen. Their hatred for him remains undiminished because, after initially encrypting their communications with Nicholas, he revealed all their secrets to the authorities. Even when presented with the possibility that Bailey could lose her life, Hannah doubts the safety of witness protection.
While they are arguing, Jules calls Hannah with the information that she has opened the piggy bank and found a will, which confirms he is Ethan Young. This document names Hannah as Bailey’s guardian, outlining all his wishes for Bailey, and indicates that Owen trusted Charlie. As this conversation is ending, Grady tells Hannah they have found Bailey and she is safe. In addition, he explains that Owen documented Avett’s misdeeds at The Shop for the authorities and that the money he left in the duffel bag is legitimate and thus will not be seized. The women will be poised to start over successfully. When Grady is momentarily distracted, Hannah flees the office because she feels like it is the best thing to do to protect Bailey.
Chapter 32: Everyone Should Take Inventory
Hannah lists what she knows about Owen, including his hobbies, habits, routines, and preferences, including that he kept Bailey away from Katherine’s family. She wonders if he will forgive her for breaking that wish.
Chapter 33: The Never Dry, Part Two
Hannah returns to the Never Dry to talk to Charlie. She shares that Owen always trusted him, as the secret will reveal, and asks for him to arrange for her to speak with Nicholas in person. Charlie insists that his father allow no deal concerning Owen because his guilt far exceeds what Hannah knows, but he is curious about what she might know about his sister, Owen’s first wife. The two slowly come to an arrangement, as Hannah shares the previous anecdote about what Owen said about his wives and Charlie admits how stressful it can be to manage people curious about his infamous father.
Analysis
The will that Owen conceals in the piggy bank plays a pivotal role in the decisions Hannah undertakes in this section, since she finally feels sure of his wishes. A last will and testament details someone’s final wishes and is legally binding. Carrying out the deceased’s wishes usually falls to a trusted survivor or attorney. In his will, Owen is honest, as he wished he could have been with Hannah in their married life but could not. Knowing that Owen truly trusts her empowers Hannah fully. Much of what alienates Hannah from Owen throughout the novel is the feeling theirs is not a true partnership. Some of this feeling stems from difficulties with Bailey, but much of it results from Owen’s lies. The hidden will restores Hannah’s faith in her husband because his honesty, along with his choice of her as Bailey’s guardian, proves that he had seen her as a genuine, trusted partner in his life.
The novel also shifts focus as knowledge supplants memories. Earlier, Hannah and Bailey act based on what their fragmented memories indicate should be their best avenue of investigation. Now Hannah has concrete information. The uncovered memories make more sense within the context of this knowledge, and the certainty the facts offer motivates Hannah to act decisively. She has learned enough from this experience not to be entirely sure of anything—for example, she still wonders whether she is making the right decision—but she is far more secure in what she does and does not know. Hannah also realizes that just as she must read meaning into the memories on which she and Bailey relied, so too must she read meaning into the facts she now has gathered as she plots her next course of action. Hannah’s admission to Charlie in “The Never Dry, Part 2” thus signals a pivotal moment of character growth. Throughout the book, Hannah has fiercely clung to the idea that she knows Owen, because the idea of her not knowing him strikes at her sense of self. She is now secure enough in herself to admit her lack of knowledge, not only to herself but also to a virtual stranger. This honesty and self-awareness are critical to her ability to work successfully with Charlie and his father in coming chapters.
Trust fuels much of the action in this part of the book, with Hannah increasingly recognizing how intertwined the concepts of trust and protection are. Still, knowing who to trust proves difficult and hard to determine. Characters must make leaps of faith, even when their decisions seem counterintuitive. Ultimately, Hannah rejects Grady’s seemingly reasonable offer of protection because she trusts her absent husband’s judgment more. Ironically, Hannah’s trust in Owen’s judgment leads her to seek out Katherine’s family, a decision that she fully recognizes counteracts his efforts to keep Bailey from her maternal relatives. Nonetheless, his trust in Hannah, even before she knew all the facts, indicates that Owen is capable of making his own leaps of faith about whom to trust. Trust forms an essential component of all the relationships in this section, because potential enemies must put their faith in each other with no real guarantee the other person warrants such trust. This ability to trust, even when it seems unwise, is precisely why Hannah can form a tentative agreement with Charlie, a man who clearly mistrusts and dislikes her beloved husband, and cannot do so with Grady, despite his insistence he only wants to help Owen.
