Ripple Effect Page 4

  Then with tears on my lashes, I duck into the bathroom before Iris converges on it to get ready for her date with Sam.

  6

  Elizabeth

  Fifteen Years Ago from Present Day

  Dear Cal,

  It’s been a few months since graduation; I hope this finds you safe and well.

  Sam came home briefly but has moved into an apartment closer to where his company is based. It’s unusual not to have him just a few moments away. In fact, I can’t remember the last time we spoke on the phone. When we last chatted, he said his training was going well, but it was consuming a lot of hours. I know he was planning on coming back for a family celebration we’re planning on having soon.

  Iris took a brief vacation, but I know she’s at a specialized training facility to enhance her language studies. She hasn’t said much, but it wouldn’t surprise me if she ends up going to work for some major international corporation or the government. I’m so proud of her.

  As for me? Well, my plans are slow but sure. I’m being very methodical. Too much is on the line for me to make mistakes. I’m in no major rush. I’ve been working for a small firm in Charleston and saving money by living at home. Trust me, that’s no hardship. We’re very close, and the location is convenient to town.

  I don’t know what I’m allowed to ask about your present situation, where you are, how things are. I’d love to be able to send you and the men and women in your unit something, but I’m not certain what the rules are. Email me back to let me know.

  Know I can’t walk past sunflowers in the farmer’s market without thinking of you.

  Stay safe and know you are missed.

  Libby

  Before pressing Send, I reread the first email I’m about to send off to Cal. I chew on my lower lip. I haven’t heard from him, but I have no idea what it is that he’s actually doing. I suppose I could ask Sam, but he’s in training. Other than Nonna’s birthday last month, I’ve barely heard from him either.

  Oh, how I wish I could pick up the phone and call Iris, but according to the letter I just got in the mail, the intensive language program in Monterey has her “submerged deeper than I ever thought I would be, Libs. If you can believe it, I actually want to hear just an American accent.”

  While I was amused by her letter, I’m left in this odd space. My heart is lost trying to find its place between what was and what is while my mind is ready to forge ahead straight into the future.

  Pressing Send, I give no more thought to the email as I answer the business line.

  “Thank you for calling Salt Gallery. This is Elizabeth. How may I help you?”

  7

  Elizabeth

  Fourteen Years Ago from Present Day

  Hello Cal.

  Iris came home today from her training in California. She was over the moon when she told me she’d taken a position with Alliance alongside Sam. I’m so excited the two of them will be working with each other. Honestly, I don’t think there’s anyone who quite understands my excitement the way you would.

  I haven’t heard back from you. Not once. Please don’t take that as complaining; it’s not. It’s just one of my relatives mentioned you may have a military email address which—depending on where you’re stationed—may be the only thing you can check. So, you may not be getting the emails I’ve been sending.

  I just wish I knew for certain if you were well.

  Things are changing here so fast! I took a MAJOR step toward accomplishing my dream last week. I haven’t even told my family yet because they’re going to flip. To be honest, I was going to tell Sam first, but he was out of the country again. Well, when he’s back for more than a day, I’ll let him know.

  If you’re getting these, send me a quick ping somehow to let me know you’re okay. I’ve included all of my contact information at the bottom of the email. I’m also going to be switching to a new business email soon. When I do, I’ll be sure to let you know.

  All my best,

  Libby

  I finish typing in my new email contact information for Deja Vu. Even though the company paperwork has just been filed, I made certain I owned the email domain. Pushing away from my desk at Salt for the last time, a small, self-satisfied smile crosses my face.

  I’m going to do it.

  My phone rings. My heart begins to pound. Not so quickly after I just sent the message, surely… “Thank you for calling Salt Gallery. This is Elizabeth. How may I help you?” Even as I say the words, they seem odd rolling off my tongue.

  I don’t belong here anymore.

  “Hey, Libs,” Josh, my older brother by three and a half years, drawls. “Do you need an escort to the ball tonight? It would not be a hardship to have two beautiful women on my arm,” he teases.

  Since I’m well aware his wife, Bailey, will be on the other side, I merely roll my eyes and hold my tongue. Tonight is Nonna’s annual charity ball. “I’ll accept the arm to walk in with the heels I’m wearing, you dork. After that, I plan to enjoy myself all on my own. I’m a grown woman,” I remind him.

  “Stop reminding me. I’m getting sick of warning off all the idiots who work for us,” he mutters.

  “Then stop warning them off.”

  “Like that will ever happen.”

  “I’ll see you at seven?” I check my personal email one last time, but it’s empty. There’s nothing in the inbox.

  And, my heart is beginning to realize, there may never be.

  So much for flowery promises, I think bitterly, as I close the lid of the laptop smartly.

  “Just promise me you’re not going to fall for some yahoo,” Josh groans.

  “I wouldn’t bet the estate on it,” I tease him breezily, before I hang up the phone in his ear. Gathering up my purse, I say goodbye to my boss, thank her again for the wonderful opportunity she gave me.

  And then I leave to try to fall in love with my future.

  8

  Elizabeth

  Thirteen Years ago from Present Day

  Calhoun,

  I overheard Iris and Sam discussing the fact you work with them at Alliance. This tells me everything I need to know.

  I wish you nothing but the best in all of your future endeavors.

  Respectfully,

  Elizabeth

  A few minutes go by before I get a ping in my email box. Startled, I open it. Somehow, I’m not surprised by the contents. The technical jargon just leads to a few simple words that solidify the unspoken message I was receiving since a month after I graduated from college.

  [[Message returned to sender. Address Unknown]]

  Very carefully, I file the message before I shut down my email program and head home.

  There are people who actually care about me there. People who want to hear about what I’ve done today and every day over the last few years. People who understand I’ve finally bloomed into the woman I was always meant to be.

  Strong, self-sufficient, and independent.

  Even if that means alone.

  9

  Present Day

  Elizabeth

  “How long was it before you saw Cal again?” Dr. Powell asks me.

  Twisting my rings around my fingers absentmindedly, I answer, “Three years. Time enough for life to have dealt me with the kind of hardship and heartache that even if I didn’t know what he went through personally, I grew up and understood the look Cal wore on his face wasn’t because he was trying to attract all the women on campus,” I say wryly. “It just had an added benefit.”

  Despite the chuckle, it doesn’t stop Dr. Powell from asking me, “What do you mean?”

  “In the years I knew Cal before, he rarely smiled. In the three years since I saw him, it was my time to learn what it took to cause someone to love like that. I understood why people saw the world through darkened eyes.”

  “That wasn’t a good thing?” A question, not a statement.

  “It’s neither good nor bad. It just is. The problem is once your innocence
is stripped away, it’s impossible to return. Despite everything that’s happened to me, to us, Cal says I manage to maintain mine.” I shake my head with regret. “I don’t see it when I look in the mirror anymore.”

  “What do you see?”

  “Like many women, I see flaws. But when I look past the surface, I can see the scars of what happened and the time we lost because of it.” Especially the lost time.

  “What happened to make you lose that innocence?”

  “The first sheen of it started to fade when I was engaged and cheated on. I know so many women who have gone through that, it’s a disgrace. Respect your partner to end a relationship before starting a new one. It’s just wrong and makes you doubt yourself in so many different ways.” Coming off my high horse, I deflate. As much as I still hate what Kyle did, it led me to Cal. But nothing erases the ache in my heart over what happened next. “I lost more of it when my grandmother, Dahlia, passed on.” Even now, I can’t say the words without painful emotions surging through me. Fumbling, I reach for the box of tissues on the table next to me.

  As I mop up the tears that begin to fall, Dr. Powell doesn’t look away the one time I wish he would. “That would be Dahlia Akin, sole heir to Akin Timbers family fortune?”

  I nod, because there’s nothing else to do.

  “I’ve heard she was quite eccentric,” he comments diplomatically instead of asking me the typical question of what it was like to grow up on a plantation still considered enormous by modern-day standards.

  I throw back my long hair and laugh. “Oh, Nonna would have said you can do much better than that, Doctor. She was a grande dame, a beautiful force, and made me long to go home every time I was away.” There’s an abundance of love in my voice that I imagine will still be there when I talk about her in my eighties.

  “When I was going through the worst of my suffering, I imagined her by my side, the sass I learned at her knee flickering through my body letting me know I wasn’t defeated though I may have been temporarily beaten. It was the gentle steel she forged in me that carried me through with the ability to come out the other side as I am.”

  A wide smile crosses the good doctor’s face. “You’ll have to indulge me a moment. Was it legend or truth that she had a room in her home dedicated to hats?”

  Even though the memories are bittersweet, I smile through my tears. “Truth. It was decorated in rose-colored velvet. Each hat had a special stand crafted out of Akin wood. And all of her grandchildren—the boys as well as the girls—wore one of those ostentatious contraptions to her funeral.”

  Deep laughter comes from the man in the chair across from me. “I wish I knew that before I spoke to your cousin Sam the other day. I might have asked him which one he wore.”

  Perhaps my smile doesn’t have the same kind of unguarded joy it would have shone with before everything happened, and so much happened between all of us. But the bonds have been repaired, so I do smile when I say, “It was hideous—a garish plum number with peonies and tiger lilies on the brim. If you do speak with him again, remind him that since he arrived late, he got stuck wearing it.”

  “Was Sam late for a reason?”

  “Yes.” I don’t elaborate.

  Dr. Powell raises his brow, waiting for me to continue, as if he has all the time in the world.

  “Sam was asked to pick up someone who wanted to pay their respects to me—to the family,” I correct myself automatically because back then, I truly had no idea what was in store when I saw Cal’s dark hair gleaming in the sun across my grandmother’s gravesite.

  “I can only imagine your family’s reaction to your cousin being late on that most important of days,” he sympathizes.

  “They were certain family members—one in particular—less than pleased to see his guest, but we all understood Sam was flying in. There was worry about how fast he would be driving. Since college, Sam had become somewhat of a speed demon.” The panic and sadness on varying cousins’ faces that day are etched in my mind. But those emotions paled when I told the family how Sam was part of the machinations that almost destroyed my life later. That’s one thing Cal never grasped until that dark period in our lives and Sam forgot about the Akin family.

  Don’t dare cross us.

  “Whatever shock they were feeling was nowhere near what I was when Calhoun Sullivan laid a bouquet of sunflowers at Nonna’s gravesite,” I admit. “Here he was after three years, with not one word to me in all that time. Yet, the darkest man I knew was bringing the sun on the saddest day of my life.”

  “What did you do?”

  “I walked away. I had no choice.” And at the time, I hadn’t. Not that Cal held that against me.

  He rarely held anything against me.

  Nothing, that is, until I walked away from our marriage without giving him a chance to explain.

  10

  Calhoun

  Twelve Years Ago from Present Day

  As we pull through the gates, I have to school my expression not to gawk at the overwhelming beauty I’m faced with. Sam slams his foot to the pedal, racing the rushing water to determine which one of us will get to our destination first. I have a feeling Sam’s determined to win even though I have no idea why we’re even here. “What the hell are we doing, Sam? Don’t we have a funeral to go to?” I demand. I’m clenching the stems of the sunflowers in my hand so tightly, I’m afraid they’re going to snap. It’s the only thing betraying my nerves at seeing Libby again.

  “We are. And I’m going to be royally fucked because I’m late.”

  “Dude, where the hell do you plan on putting someone else in this car? The trunk?” Sam picked me up in a silver Corvette after I finished my part of the debrief at Alliance. He was discharged hours earlier and went to get our ride. Not that I don’t appreciate the sweet set of wheels, but with both of us being as tall as we are, the only thing that will fit into the tiny jump seat is a toddler.

  Maybe. But it will still be a tight fit.

  He doesn’t say a word. When I hazard a look over, there’s a ticking in his jaw. “We’re not picking up anyone. Nonna’s being buried here.” Sam drops the gear and presses the pedal again, whether to make up for time or his pent-up frustration, I don’t know.

  And I forget about it as the house comes into view. I can’t hold back the “Holy crap” that escapes my mouth.

  “And that’s just the main house. Wait till you see the rest of the homes on the property.” Sam slams on the brake, which flings us both forward, before sliding his car expertly into a reserved parking spot. If I didn’t know any better, I’d swear we’d just pulled into a luxury-used-car lot because there isn’t a single car here that doesn’t cost less than my former military salary.

  “Sam?” I start to ask, but before I can get the question out, a little girl comes running toward us wearing an adorable pink velvet hat on her head. In her hands, she’s carrying the ugliest monstrosity of one I’ve ever seen.

  “Sam! This is the last one left!” She flaps the hat at him. He scoops her up in his arms and twirls the pretty princess around in his arms for a moment, burying his head deep into her neck. “I told Nanny it wasn’t your color.”

  “And what did she say to that?” He blows a raspberry into her neck, making her giggle.

  I stand back, not wanting to intrude. She could have been Libby’s child with her shining dark hair down the middle of her back.

  “Nanny said you should have been here on time, and then you could have worn…” Suddenly, the little girl notices me. Scooching next to Sam, she says, “Hello.”

  Smoothing a hand over her head, Sam says, “Sydney, I want you to meet my friend Calhoun.”

  Instinctively, I squat down to her level and hold out a hand. “Hello, Sydney. My friends call me Cal.”

  Her green eyes, so like Libby’s, widen. “You know my Aunt Libby too.” She begins to edge forward.

  Dropping my hand, I flick my eyes up to Sam, who shrugs. “I do.”

  She studi
es me a moment before coming to a stop next to me. Even though I don’t want to intimidate the child, something tells me to stand. Neither of us say anything while I get an inspection that would have done Admiral Yarborough proud. Finally, Sydney does something I’m sure my many enemies would have loved to have done on many an occasion.

  She stomps on my foot. Hard.

  I yelp in surprise, almost dropping the sunflowers. Who knew such a tiny thing had such power?

  “Sydney Elizabeth!” Sam yells. “What was that for?”

  “Boys aren’t supposed to make you cry. You taught me that, Sam.” Stomping past him, she shoves the hat in his hand. “Here. We’re in the back waiting on you.”

  After Sydney runs out of earshot, I turn to my partner and hiss, “Care to explain?”

  He sighs before slipping the ridiculous hat on his head. “I honestly have no idea. But right now, I have to say goodbye to the woman who taught us all everything.”

  I nod. Even though I never had what Sam did growing up—a family, ties to keep me in one place, love—I appreciate the bonds that form over time when you’re with people for extended periods of time. It’s why I’m here to support him.

  And maybe now that I’m stateside for a while, to see if Libby still needs some sunflowers.

  Later as we’re listening to the eulogy, I’m trying to control my shock. I never would have put together that Elizabeth and Sam are two of the many grandchildren of the legendary Dahlia Akin, American heiress. I’ve known Sam for years, and although I’m certain it came up in his security check, he’s never lived above his Alliance salary.