Chapter 23
Ace
I don’t know what’s going on at first, but one minute Shannon’s calling my name and the next she's sliding to the ground. I catch her, of course, but she’s so damn pale, her skin clammy as I try to figure out what’s going on with her.
Someone from the boat runs over to see if we need help, and though I’m fairly certain she’s having some kind of anxiety attack, I carry her back on board with Chris, Aubrey, and her mother following.
Chris tells me he’ll handle our luggage, so I’m able to focus on Shannon, holding her hand and trying to keep her breathing steadily as she breaks out in a cold sweat. Her mother is fluttering around us, clearly unsure what to do, but I don’t give a damn about her right now.
I have to make sure Shannon is okay because seeing her freak out like this pisses me off. This is all her mother’s doing, and unless I’m completely off the mark, she caused her daughter so much anxiety, she had a physical reaction to the stress.
“I think she’s okay now,” I say, taking a wet cloth someone brought us and pressing it against the back of her neck. She turned white as a ghost, but now that she’s lying down, her color is slowly coming back.
“I’m sorry for all the trouble,” Shannon tells me quietly.
I smile. “You’re not any trouble.”
“Perhaps the stress of the holidays, yes?” the cruise director suggests in her slightly accented English. “Has this happened before?”
“No.” Shannon shakes her head. “I’ve never had a reaction like this, not even when my father died.”
“Sometimes, things hit us in ways we do not understand. Yoga helps me with this, but I know it’s not for everyone.”
“Usually I run,” Shannon admits. “But between final exams at the school where I work and then the cruise, I haven’t worked out at all.”
“Well, you’ll be okay.” The cruise director pats her shoulder.
Someone brings us a bottle of water, and Shannon takes a few sips.
Chris and Aubrey are pacing like expectant parents, and Samantha hovers, watching intently but not saying a word. It takes about thirty minutes for Shannon’s color to return and for her to stop shaking, and at that point, she looks flustered and uncomfortable at being the center of attention.
“This is so embarrassing,” Shannon whispers, closing her eyes.
“Honey, there’s nothing to be embarrassed about. It happens. A lot more than you think.”
“Yes, but right there in front of the boat and everyone.”
“We just want you to be okay,” Aubrey says softly, reaching for her hand.
“I’m better now. Really.”
“Shannon.” Samantha’s shaky voice makes Shannon look up and she finally sits, taking the cloth off her neck and giving me a grateful look before turning to Aubrey and ignoring her mother altogether.
“You’re going to miss your flight,” she says.
“I already took care of it,” Chris cuts in. “Don’t worry about it. We’re on a flight tomorrow.”
“Oh, no. You’ve been so anxious to get home…” Shannon looks horrified.
“My son is fine. I’ve been a bit of a nervous Nelly, but he’s with family who adore him and are spoiling him rotten. He’ll be fine one more day.” Aubrey smiles comfortingly.
“But will you?”
Aubrey chuckles. “Now that I know you’re okay? Absolutely.”
“We have to go,” Shannon says abruptly, trying to stand up.
I slide my arm around her waist. “Easy. Your body was trying to tell you you’re overdoing it. Just sit a little longer.”
Shannon looks like she’s going to protest but then nods.
“We’re going to give you all a little privacy,” Aubrey says, leaning into Chris. “We’ll be outside if you need us.”
“Thank you.” Shannon squeezes her hand.
Samantha sinks onto the couch on one side of Shannon while I sit on the other.
“This is all my fault,” Samantha says sadly. “I’m so sorry. I was just trying to do what your father asked of me, but as usual when it comes to you, I messed everything up.”
“What Dad…” Shannon’s eyes narrow slightly. “What are you talking about, Mom? What, exactly, did you do?”
“I wanted… You were so unhappy… Your divorce…” Samantha sniffles and digs in her purse for a tissue, dabbing at her eyes.
“I wanted you to be happy, to find love and have a family. Your divorce just proved that I was the wrong person to choose someone for you, so I…” She swallows. “I followed your father’s advice.”
“Which was?” Shannon seems as confused as I feel.
“He knew you’d never forgotten Andrew, er, Ace, and before he got sick the last time, he’d been planning to get in touch with him.
Maybe get you two in the same room again, like he did the first time.
You see…” Her voice is so soft it’s hard to hear her.
“If he’d been old-fashioned like I was and believed in arranged marriages, Ace would have been his choice for you.
But he didn’t believe in that kind of thing, and I didn’t approve anyway. ”
I choke back the emotion filling my chest. I was close to my CO and heartbroken when I learned he passed away.
Missing his funeral gutted me, but I had no choice, and men who do what I do for a living learn early on that sacrifice is part of the deal.
It helps knowing he felt that way about me, that he wanted me to be with his daughter, his only child.
Shannon doesn’t say anything, just watches as her mother struggles to continue.
“Anyway, like I told you before, I didn’t want you to marry a soldier, a military man.
I wanted you to have a man who would be around to help you raise your children, for the good and the bad times…
so I discouraged this idea your father had about you and Ace.
The night you two met at the charity dinner, when Shannon was finally an adult, I saw the way you looked at each other and did my best to intervene.
“At the time, I thought it was fortuitous that Ace was leaving on a mission and not coming back—” Her eyes widen as if she realizes how that sounds. “I mean, not coming back to live in D.C., not…”
“It’s okay.” I give her a small smile. “I know what you meant.”
“So, when Wayne was close to the end, after watching Shannon suffer through that horrible marriage I’d arranged for her, he told me my penance was to find a way to get the two of you together.
” Her eyes fill with tears. “But you became so stubborn after your divorce. Once it was final and you had a little time to breathe, you moved to Germany. I didn’t know how to make this happen, but it was your father’s dying wish, so I came up with a plan.
” She dabs at her eyes again. “A bad plan, but one your father and I had loosely talked about.”
“Finding someone to stalk me?” Shannon demands.
“Paying someone to pretend to stalk you,” Samantha amends quietly.
“I know, in retrospect, it was stupid, but I was desperate. You weren’t moving home, Ace didn’t appear to be retiring, and though I didn’t know for sure he was in the CIA, I suspected.
I knew it would take something serious to get him to go to you, so I came up with a plan.
Sandra wasn’t supposed to hurt you or actually take anything, just do some annoying little things to worry you. ”
“Oh, Mom.” Shannon looks so sad, I want to reach for her, but this is between them and I have to let them hash it out, no matter how much I want to strangle her mother.
“When you started to think you were going crazy, I called Ace because I didn’t want it to go on too long.
I thought he’d show up in Cologne, you two would reconnect and the stalker thing would go away once I confessed my machinations.
Except Sandra’s part in the plan escalated when she ransacked your apartment, and when I told her the gig was up, she behaved quite strangely.
I wanted to tell you but I didn’t know how, and then you two left to go on that cruise, so I thought I had a few days to sort it out. ”
“And what if we hadn’t reconnected?” Shannon demands. “Were you just going to make her disappear and leave me thinking I was crazy?”
“No, of course not. I was always going to come clean. But everything happened so fast, and then you caught Ace on the nanny cam, which almost mucked up everything. You went away together, though, and once you told me you were involved—”
“You mean when I told you we’d slept together.”
Samantha flushes. “Yes. That. My plan was to meet you in Cologne once you got back and tell you what I’d done.
I thought I had a fifty-fifty shot of you forgiving me if you and Ace were together, but of course, Ace’s colleague found my connection to Sandra and then you wouldn’t answer my calls…
Everything spiraled and I’m so sorry.” She starts to cry, and Shannon starts to cry, and I sit there like an idiot, unsure what to do.
Her mother did something over-the-top and stupid, but not malicious, and the end result is that Shannon and I did, indeed, get together.
At least I hope so. But Samantha’s methods were sketchy, and Sandra turned out to be an asshole, so everything is a big mess and poor Shannon is right smack in the middle of it.
Where we go from here is anybody’s guess.