Chapter 66
Shannon sat in the world’s most uncomfortable green vinyl chair, pulled close to the hospital bed.
Her daughter was sleeping. Just an hour earlier, a nurse she’d never met before had bustled into the cubicle and taken Livvy off the oxygen.
The nurse’s name was Beth. “Your daughter’s gonna be fine,” Beth said, washing her hands at the sink. “I hear you work upstairs?”
“In ICU,” Shannon said. “Did her drug screen come back yet?”
Beth hesitated.
“This is my kid we’re talking about. And it’s just between us,” Shannon promised.
“Your kid is lucky. We see a lot of girls in here, some guy they meet at a bar dopes their drink, and… the worst happens.”
“No lasting effects, right?” Shannon had worked the ER early in her nursing career, but that was well before roofies and date rape drugs were a thing.
“Shouldn’t be,” Beth said. “Her doctor will probably want to do follow-ups, make sure her liver function is good, but they’ll tell you about that with all her discharge papers.”
Shannon could have wept from relief.
“Your friend is still out in the waiting room. Why don’t the two of you go get some coffee or something to eat? It’s slow right now. I’ll stay with Olivia. Give me your number, and I’ll text you if she wakes up.”
Shannon scribbled her cell number on a scrap of paper and handed it over. “Thanks. I guess some caffeine would be good.”
Traci was dozing when she felt something tugging at her hair, which had come loose from her hair clip.
“Come on, spacy Traci, wake up. Let’s go get a cup of joe.”
She opened her eyes to see Shannon sitting next to her, wan and bleary-eyed.
Shannon led the way to the cafeteria. They each bought bad coffee and a stale muffin, then sat in the mostly empty room, their weary faces turned a ghoulish shade of yellow from the overhead fluorescent lighting.
“How’s Liv?” Traci asked, taking a sip of the scalding brew.
“Still sleeping, but the nurse tells me all her blood work looks good and there shouldn’t be any lasting after-effects. How’s Felice?”
“Awake and eager to get cut loose of here,” Traci said. “We just need the attending to sign her discharge papers.”
“That’s great. Really great. What’ll she do now? Do you think she’ll go back to work at the Saint? After everything that’s happened to her?”
“The first thing she said when we were alone was that she can’t wait to get back to work,” Traci said.
“The dorm. Is anything left?”
“The fire chief called me a couple hours ago; it’s still standing. They won’t know more until daylight, but he expects there’ll be a lot of smoke and water damage.”
“Will you rebuild?”
“Probably. Our staff can’t afford to live nearby. In fact, before the fire, and all the stuff that’s gone on, I was thinking we need to come up with some other affordable housing solutions for our people.”
Shannon blew on her coffee to cool it. “What happened tonight? The only thing I could get out of the deputy was that they already caught one of the guys.”
Traci gave her a quick recap of the night’s events. “That was KJ Parkhurst. His grandparents have had a house on the property for decades. Ric is friends with the kid’s dad and promised to give KJ a summer job—without consulting me.”
Shannon made a face. “Ugh. Ric Eddings raises his ugly head once more. I can’t believe you’ve had to put up with his crap all these years.”
“Unfortunately, it now looks like Livvy will have to put up with it too.”
“If you think my kid is gonna let an asshole like Ric bully her, you really don’t know her.”
Traci guffawed. “You’re right. Livvy is gonna be a total thorn in his side. And I’m gonna have a front-row seat.”
She reached for Shannon’s hand. “Do you think she’ll have any interest in coming back to work for me at the hotel? I mean, I know she won’t actually need a job, but selfishly, she’s the best guest relations person I’ve ever had.”
“If it was up to me, I’d say hell no,” Shannon said. “I’m hoping she’ll finish college and get a degree. But it’s not my decision. And I guess what I’ve learned from all of this is that she’s got a hell of a head on her shoulders.”
“So you’re gonna let her decide?” Traci looked dubious.
“I’m not saying I won’t lobby for college, but I will promise to try not to be so controlling. And judgmental,” Shannon added, with a wink.
She took in Traci’s disheveled appearance and the dark circles under her eyes. “And what about you? Are you gonna be okay?”
“I think I’m still in shock. Especially about Charlie. I thought I knew him. The sheriff’s deputy told me that when they went to talk to Charlie, he was gone. Apparently he’d been stealing from the hotel for quite a while. Whelan told me some stuff about what he’d found out about Charlie. I had no idea. At all.”
“Whelan? You mean your new not-boyfriend? How’s he involved in all this?”
“He used to own a big private security outfit. He sold it last year, I gather at a nice profit, and he decided it was finally time to find out the truth about his brother’s death—and why his mother’s life fell apart afterward. But you already know that part.”
“Yeah, remember? He came to see me here at work. Asked me to go back over what happened that day at the pool, but I never did hear if he got any answers to his questions.”
“He got his answers. And they’re pretty ugly,” Traci said. “Hudson had an undiagnosed peanut allergy. That day, right before he got to the pool, he ate a huge bag of peanut MM’s, given to him by a beach lifeguard who drove a flashy red Corvette and flirted with every girl on the island. And who was apparently having a secret fling that summer with Hudson’s mom.”
Shannon’s eyes narrowed. “Are you talking about Ric? I’ll never forget that car.”
“Yeah. Me neither. Whelan tracked down his stepfather, Hudson’s dad, whom he hadn’t seen since the day of Hudson’s funeral. The guy had hired a private pathologist, who did a thorough autopsy, which is when they discovered that Hudson drowned because he’d gone into anaphylactic shock. From the peanuts.”
“What?” Shannon’s voice echoed in the mostly empty cafeteria.
“It wasn’t our fault, Shan. There was nothing we could have done to save him.”
Shannon’s pale face contorted with anger. “All these years. I blamed myself. I blamed you. But it was Ric. Whenever something bad happens, it’s always Ric.”
“Or the old man,” Traci said. “Whelan’s stepfather as much as admitted that Fred paid him off to avoid an ugly lawsuit, and the scandal.”
Shannon started to say something, but her phone buzzed to signal an incoming text. She stood abruptly, still clutching the foam cup of coffee. “Livvy’s awake. I gotta go.”