Ripple Effect Read online

  “Well, you know us, Cal. We know how to enjoy ourselves.” As soon as the words pass her lips, Iris looks like she got goose-egged herself when Sam slides into the booth on her side.

  He smiles easily at me. “Cousin, do you know what to do with the trouble sitting next to you?”

  “Who says I plan on doing anything?” I drawl, earning a loud guffaw from Sam and Iris.

  Cal just looks thoughtful.

  “I have big news,” Sam announces.

  “Oh, what’s that?” I lean forward eagerly. Although I have an older brother, Sam and I being mere months apart in age, we were raised practically as twins.

  “I got a job,” he announces proudly.

  A thrilled gasp escapes my lips. Suddenly, I’m shoving at Cal. “Get out of my way,” I demand. “I need to congratulate him.”

  “Don’t you want to hear what it is?” Cal asks with a bemused expression.

  I’m still shoving at his shoulder even as I contemplate climbing over the table. “It doesn’t matter. Look at him.” I beam when I do. “He’s so happy right now, he’s lighting up the room.”

  Cal hesitates for just a second, murmuring, “I think that’s you who’s doing that, Libby.” But he slides out of the booth so I can make my way over to Sam to hug him.

  “I am so, so proud of you. Was it that government contractor you were telling me about? The one with offices overseas? Confederation?”

  Sam chuckles as he squeezes the breath out of me. When did the scrawny boy who used to fish while I read on the banks of the Cooper River grow up? I bury my head against his shoulder to avoid those memories right now, knowing we’ll never have those carefree days again. “Alliance, and yes. That’s the one.”

  “When will you tell the family?” He lets me go. I turn to slide back into the booth only to be startled. Cal’s been standing waiting patiently for us to finish. Slipping past him, I sit back down.

  It must be my imagination that he slides a little closer when he sits back down himself.

  “I wanted to tell you first. I’ll call Mom and Dad sometime tomorrow,” Sam tells me.

  “Good.” I flash a grin at him. “I want to be able to tell my parents I knew before they did.”

  Sam leans over and tweaks my nose. “What about you? Are you still heading back to Charleston after graduation?”

  I nod. I’ve known what I’ve wanted for my life since the first day I ever entered Stafford Antiques with Nonna. Miss Julie gave me cookies and a tour of her store, telling me where all the beautiful treasures were from. And I imagined if I had all the money in the world, where I would put them in my house. It wasn’t long after, I began to redecorate first my room, then my parents’ home, and eventually Nonna’s home on the estate with an emphasis on our family heirlooms.

  “I’ve been waiting for this moment since I was six, Sam.” We both exchange grins at the truth of my statement. “It’s time.”

  “Time? Time for what?” Cal’s demanding question forces me to turn toward him.

  I shrug before picking up my drink. Wrinkling my nose, I attempt another sip. “I’m a dual major, fine arts and business. I’ve got plans of my own.”

  Pursing his lips at my nonanswer, Cal plucks my drink out of my hand—my drink! Taking a swallow, he mutters, “You need to be drinking better than this.”

  I shrug. “It’s what I can afford.” At least on a student budget, which I’m determined to live on while I’m here.

  “I can afford better.” Flagging down a waitress, he orders me a glass of wine—the brand I would normally drink at home. Before she can escape, he asks Sam and Iris, “Anything else?”

  Iris holds up her almost empty beer. “I’ll take another.”

  Sam shakes his head. “I’m driving.”

  “That will do it, then. Thanks.” Cal dismisses the harried woman before turning his not-insubstantial attention back to me.

  I’m stunned and a little taken aback. “I was okay with what I had.”

  Flicking a stray hair away from my face, he shrugs as if it’s no big deal. Then again, to him, it probably isn’t, I remind myself. He brings us back around to what we were discussing as he polishes off the dredges of the drink I’d been nursing. “So, a dual major? That’s impressive. Do you already have a job lined up back in Charleston?”

  I duck my head. It’s not something I share with a lot of people. “Less of a job, more of a dream.”

  “I like the idea of you having dreams, Libby.” My head snaps up. An arc of something different moves between us. We’re butting up against a line I stopped daring to toe up against.

  Then I know I’m not imagining the brief flit of a smile that crosses his lips after the new wine is put down in between us and he takes a sip before I can even reach for it. Handing it to me, his voice drops as he says, “Much better. It tastes like something the sun actually kissed versus something it killed.”

  The comment is so outrageous, I toss my hair back and laugh. When I finish, Cal’s still smiling. I reach for the wine and declare flippantly, “You should smile more. You’re incredibly handsome when you do.”

  Even though Cal’s smile fades—a terrible shame—the words he whispers in my ear will make me remember that smile forever.

  “Since you’re going to be leaving soon, I suppose it’s safe to tell you the only time I ever think about smiling is when I’m around you.”

  He sits back and rests an arm over the back of the booth, leaving me frozen in place.

  Why would he say that to me? Why now when we’ve got less than two weeks left until I leave?

  Picking up the wine, I take a long drink and hate that he’s right. It does taste like liquid sunlight. And I’ll never be able to drink it again without thinking of him.

  3

  Calhoun

  Fifteen Years Ago from Present Day

  Libby Akin is causing me to lose sleep and not in a way that gives me any sort of satisfaction.

  I roll over and punch my pillow in the off-campus apartment I live in, unable to stop thinking of her mahogany-brown hair and gem-colored eyes. While I’m recovering from a few injuries I sustained on my last assignment, I was sent here to scout out and recruit candidates for Alliance. Both of our time here is almost over.

  It’s why I haven’t touched her the way I’ve been dying to.

  But God, what I wouldn’t give to have her beautiful smile warm the cold dark parts of me. It’s impossible not to know when she’s in the vicinity, and that’s not simply when I’m around her cousin. All I have to do is walk out the political science building where a former Alliance employee contacted the Admiral six months ago about a few potential recruits and wham! I know she’s there when her laughter peals out above the melee of students.

  When she touches me, even if it’s in the most innocent of ways, my skin tingles. My heart rate starts to accelerate faster than if I’ve just clocked five miles. And my cock? It’s harder than if one of the women I’ve fucked since I’ve been here has lavished attention on it for hours.

  Because it’s just Libby. And the truth is she’s the only thing I’ve ever wanted in a life where I’ve been given nothing.

  Rolling onto my back, I make out the whirring blades of the ceiling fan in the dark. At least this assignment comes with a bed, I think ruefully. The last one involved sleeping bags and sand for much longer than I enjoyed. Rubbing the heel of one calloused foot up my leg to feel the scar, I remember the blisters I suffered as the fine sand of the Middle Eastern desert found its way into my combat boots. Pain in the ass. Sand doesn’t come out of anything. I’m certain I was still shitting it when the Admiral told me I was coming here; I ate so much of it. But it was worth it. We managed to rescue the Bahraini ambassador’s son without starting an international incident.

  At twenty-eight, I’ve done more than I ever expected to do in this life. I’ve visited more countries on the map than most people have heard of, many of which I couldn’t even identify in my youth growing up in a foste
r home after my mother decided she’d had enough of motherhood after three short days and abandoned me in a gas station in nowheresville Georgia.

  While my resume officially reads I’m a member of the National Guard, the reality is I’ve worked for Alliance since my junior year of college. At the beginning, I interned for the Charleston-based company doing nothing but admin work. It was one of our former team leaders who noticed me staying late and studying mission reports with hungry eyes. “That mission was completed FUBARed,” he drawled. “See anything you would have done differently, Cal?”

  My guard was up, because I was uncertain if I was in trouble for reviewing the materials. But I was cleared to read them. After all, part of my job was to make certain they ended up in the right hands. But still, I answered honestly. “Your point man gave away your position, whether he intended to or not. You need to rework your signal process,” I told him bluntly.

  He acknowledged my feedback with a brisk nod before walking out the door without another word. I was certain I was fucked the next day when I was called into Ret. Admiral Richard Yarborough’s office. Yarborough, the owner of Alliance, was and is not a man to fuck with. A former SEAL, he was taken out due to a shot to the leg that shattered his kneecap. Unwilling to sit on the sidelines, he brought together a coalition of the best civilians to operate with permission of the government to go where they can’t due to negotiated treaties and peace agreements.

  Alliance has never been limited by such boundaries.

  “So, I hear I have a mole, Sullivan?”

  “What…what do you mean, sir?” I stuttered. He spun his chair around to face me.

  “Byers called me last night and said you spotted what he didn’t. The signals were compromised—we could have lost brave men and women out there.” He gestures to a chair in front of his mammoth desk. “Please sit.”

  I did, not because he asked me, but because my legs were so filled with jelly, I was afraid I was going to fall down. “Maybe it’s because I’m removed from it all,” I offered.

  He snorted. “Bullshit, son. It’s because you have an aptitude for this business. Now, have you ever heard of OCS?”

  My face paled. “Is that another company?” Alliance was the only family I knew. I didn’t want to leave.

  “Officer Candidate School, Cal. We’re going to get you in as soon as you graduate. Then”—Yarborough’s eyes gleamed with unholy amusement—“we’re going to get you out.”

  I finished college at twenty, OCS by the time I was twenty-one. And by the time I was twenty-three, there was an “accident” that required a medical discharge requiring me to be released out of my five-year commitment to the Navy. At least that’s what Yarborough arranged.

  Since then, I’ve traveled the world anywhere Alliance has sent me—including my current assignment on this college campus. Here, the “professor” became the student in so many ways, and I begin to wonder if Yarborough didn’t arrange for that knife to slice into me. Before, I never understood when we’d try to rescue families with the guarantee of asylum, they would elect to live in the bowels of poverty. “You no understand. Wife gone.” Then they’d turn away, asking only for the food and medical supplies we’d readily offer to leave when we were willing to offer them so much more. I witnessed people crying over loved ones, and while I felt compassion, I never understood their heartbreak.

  Not until a smile more powerful than the sun started lighting the dark corners of my heart.

  For the first time, I understood why men would break allegiance, disregard political survival, and beg for mercy. But I know better than to reach out for it. After all, as Yarborough once said, “Peace is a facade we convince our families of so they can sleep at night. Right, Sullivan?”

  My laconic “I don’t have a family” earned me a slap on the back. It might be the first and last time being an orphan was a bonus. Forget about the years of looking at the door every time there was a knock wondering if it was someone coming to claim me—as if I meant something to someone.

  For once meaning nothing to anyone seemed a bonus when Yarborough said, “Good. Then there’s nothing anyone can hold over you.”

  Rolling to my side, I realize it was a mistake to touch the silk of Libby’s hair tonight. Now, I’ll never forget what the strands felt like between my fingers. Angry, I grab my phone, determined to find a way to forget her.

  But even as my finger hovers over the buttons, I find myself going to my photos. Flipping through, I find a picture I snapped of Libby when she was sitting on the walls of the quad. Someone had just dropped a pile of leaves over her head. Instead of being angry and seeking retaliation, something I likely would have done, she reached down and threw them up in the air again with a laugh. God, her beauty hurts my heart. Her smile is the kind that would bring me to my knees if I’d met her in a different life.

  “Somehow you’re always seeking the sun. It’s too bad I live in the shadows.” Closing the phone, I toss it onto the nightstand, determined to get some sleep.

  I need to be up early for a run with our newest recruit tomorrow at 0500.

  * * *

  “You’re a sadistic bitch, Cal,” Sam pants next to me. He’s running in wingtips per today’s instructions. I have little doubt his feet are going to be blistered later.

  I smirk, my breathing easy as we take another hill. No one’s up this early to hear his suffering. “What if you had to run for your life, Sam? You’re not always going to be in running sneakers and compression socks.”

  “That’s not why you suck,” he mutters.

  I’m unperturbed when I ask, “Not that I care, but curiosity has me now. Why am I a sadist?”

  “A sadistic bitch,” he corrects. I’m pleased to see his breathing has evened out. He doesn’t answer me for a few as our shoes slap along the old gravel road I chose specifically for its rough terrain. “It’s because you make this look so easy,” he says.

  I jolt to a stop, so of course Sam does too. “Sam,” I reply carefully. “I’ve been doing this for seven years, three of those in the military. You’re coming straight into Alliance because you’re a fucking genius with a computer. We just don’t want you to end up dead in the process of working out in the field.”

  “I know. That would piss Libby and our family off to no end.”

  Shaking my head, I begin running again with Sam keeping pace. “You’re the oddest person I’ve ever recruited.”

  “Yeah, but I bet I’m the only one who has a family member you’ve got the hots for,” he says cheerfully.

  And I trip. Fortunately, I catch myself before I go down on the sharp stones lining the trail. “Jesus Christ,” I growl.

  Sam laughs at me. “So, what are you going to do about it?”

  “Nothing.”

  Disappointment etches his face. “Why not?”

  Rubbing the back of my neck, I glare at him. “Because it’s not a good decision.”

  “Hmm.” Sam stretches.

  Smart man, I think approvingly as I begin to do the same. But the silence that stretches out between us starts to annoy me. “What?” I finally ask.

  “I never took you for a coward,” he says offhandedly.

  My muscles all lock. “Excuse me?”

  He backs away. “Now, Cal, I just meant in terms of matters of this. You’re a badass.”

  Fucking right I am. “Better run, Sam. If I catch up, there’s going to be hell to pay,” I warn him in a lethal voice.

  He takes off in a sprint.

  I take a moment to rub my hand over my chest where the shot he landed aimed true. I am a coward when it comes to Libby Akin. I want her so damn much, I’m afraid of what will happen when I have to leave.

  And I always do. There’s always more risk, another mission, another life to protect.

  I just wish I could take a piece of her with me.

  Jogging after Sam, I see him a few hundred yards ahead with his head between his legs. When he sees me, he straightens before sprinting away. Even
though I hadn’t planned on educating him on evasive techniques this morning, it looks like Sam’s about to get a small lesson in it.

  * * *

  Every Sunday since I started working here last semester, there’s been a local farmer’s market in town. Normally, I go first thing in the morning so I can beat the students who end up coming down later in the day. But now that I’m training Sam, I don’t make it until 10:30. I race through, picking up fresh fruit and vegetables for the week, before I make my way for the exit.

  I freeze in place when I see Libby. Juggling my packages, I manage to get my phone out and snap a picture of her surrounded by flowers. It may be my imagination, but she laughs at something the elderly woman says, and the sunflowers seem to reach for her. “Beautiful,” I murmur aloud.

  Libby accepts a bouquet of purple flowers wrapped in cellophane with another smile before turning her back and walking away. In her arms she’s also managing a cake box with a carefully wrapped present on top.

  Dialing quickly, I hear, “Didn’t you torture me enough this morning?” growled by Sam in my ear.

  “Is it a special occasion for Libby?” I ask without answering him.

  “Not that I know of.” He sounds confused.

  “Birthday, anniversary of an important date? I can find out, but I’d prefer you think.”

  “It’s not her birthday, Cal. That’s October 1st.”

  I commit the date to my memory and then ask, “Then why is she carrying a cake, a bouquet of flowers, and…”

  With a yelp, Sam yells, “What kind of flowers?”

  “I don’t know. They were purple.”

  “They were irises, Cal. It’s Iris’s birthday! Shit, I can’t walk, and I need to go to her birthday dinner at Libby’s.”

  “Go take a shower. I’ll pick up some flowers for you to bring to her and drop them by with some Tiger Balm.” His relieved sigh worries me a bit. “Are you going to be able to let her go?” Sam’s growing feelings for Libby’s best friend are starting to concern me.