Spiders Web - A Hannibal Fanfiction

The (not so) empty house

"You didn't cry over me, did you?" A familiar voice welcomed her in the shadows of her home.
"Not a single tear!" She turned on the lights just to see the micro expression of a smile run over Hannibal's face.
"Good!" He said it like she's been a brave little girl. It made shivers run down her spine and back up again to her with memories clouding up mind.
"What are you doing here?" She asked still standing by the door that went shut with an almost unhearable clack.
"I quite like what you made out of the place! Really nice! Not so dark and depressed how I left it!" He looked pleasingly through the open living and kitchen room from his place in an armchair by the fireplace, avoiding her question.
"You mean how you left me with it!"
"So convenient you kept one of my suits!" With a smile in his voice he stroked his tie flat. "Not out of sentiment I hope!"
"Just as a reminder of what you did to me!"
He laughed a little. "Oh Anne! Like you need a reminder! It's not like it's all backed up in the pretty mind of yours!"
"You're right! There are reminders of you all over my body!"
"Your skin is flawless as ever!" He stated, then paused and said with a smile; "Ah I see! Scars of the soul! You should see a psychiatrist!"
"Any recombinations?!" She swallowed hard but couldn't get rid of the lump in her throat.
"Oh a few! But dealing with the past is going back and when you step backwards you won't end up in the future, and we don't want that, do we?!" He sounded so delighted, not like someone who'd just crawled out of the ocean with salt water in his lungs and a bullet in his abdomen.
"Oh really, do we?!" She knew she was rude but she needed him to know that she wasn't afraid of him despite the fact that every pore in her body told her to run.
"Anna!" The way he said her name spoke for itself, she was walking on thin ice, and somehow it made her feel alive.
"Do you want a glass of wine? And something to eat?" She aimed for fire on the ice by stepping back to the waterfront, planning her next attack.
"Sounds lovely!" He said friendly.
She put off her coat and went to the kitchen to pour glasses of blood red wine. Hannibal's look was burning in her neck causing a tickle. She handed him a half full glass and admired how he smelled the fermented fruit before he took a sip. It was a habit of his she'd discovered very late, like his true nature. She shook the thought away to concentrate on dinner preparations.
Hannibal who seemed to unable to stand for a long time, sat down at the table and watched every single one of her movements.
"Liver!" He stated after a while in the with classical music filled background.
"Yes!"
"Who was he?"
"A real estate agent who wanted to buy this property! He was sniffing around! Killed him this morning! Also took his heart! I can serve it tomorrow if you'd like!"
"I'd love to! And I'd love to assist in the kitchen!"
"Very well!" She was already decorating the plates.
"At least he'll fulfil one purpose! He must have been a lousy agent! Those houses will be washed away by the sea soon! No one would invest a penny!"
"Lousy and rude!" She placed one plate in front of Hannibal and sat down with hers opposite of him.
"Bon appétit!" She said to signalise him he could begin, while she just took another big sip from the wine. She would need a lot of it but not too much. Enough to cope with him around, but not too much to be helpless should he try something. Like her state of soberness could guarantee her any chance against Hannibal Lecter. Even if he was injured he still was 10 times stronger than her, and faster, in body and mind.
"Wonderful Anne! Compliments to the chef! You learnt a lot!"
She smiled and for the first time tonight it was an honest, fear free one.
One of the few things she'd always had enjoyed while being with Hannibal was the cooking. He was an amazing cook if you could forget what or better who was in some of his creations.
She'd liked it so much that she'd continued to learn and thrive as a chef and more.
"Thank you very much!"
"You're welcome!"
They continued to eat in drop dead silence for a while.
"Are you going to tell me how you did it? How you escaped the salty waves?"
"I'm going to think about it!"
"Alright!" She didn't even know herself why she was bothered.
"You seem eager about it!"
"It's just... One minute I hear you're dead and the next you're sitting stitched and suited up in my living room! I didn't expect any less from you, it's just.. I'm curious! And what about Will?!"
She thought she saw Hannibal jump as she mentioned Graham's name, but maybe it was what she'd just wished to see. It would show a side of Hannibal she didn't know much of, his human one.
Even though there had been moments when she'd believed he'd really liked her, or even loved her. But maybe those thoughts had been just symptom moments of Stockholm syndrome. She couldn't tell now. But she knew that Hannibal cared about Will, in one way or another and she would use it to her own advantage.
"I don't know about Will!" Hannibal said taut and they continued to eat to the flames crackling in the fire place and the distant sound of violins and the sea.