Ripple Effect

by Jerald, Tracey

  I’m too busy trying to breathe. “What did you say?”

  Sam’s brow furrows. “I said, back in college you were a dick of a professor…” I surge to my feet.

  Could it really be that simple?

  “God, my life? It’s always about shitty timing.”

  “Sam,” I say woodenly as I make my way toward the stairs. “I need you to cover at the office for a few days.”

  “What? Why?”

  My foot on the bottom step, I turn and face them. Sam’s expression is confused whereas Josh looks proud.

  “Figured it out, finally?” he asks me.

  “She went back to the beginning—to our beginning. And now, if I want to make it there before dark, I’d better get on the road.”

  Taking the stairs two at a time, I burst through the door of the master bedroom—it won’t be ours until Libby is back in it. Quickly heading into the closet, I throw together a bag of clothes, enough to last me a week. “Fuck it, the town’s big enough I can buy anything I forgot.”

  Tossing the bag over my shoulder, I step back into the bedroom. Sam’s in the doorway. “Well? Where is she?” he demands. “If I go home and tell Iris you found her without letting her know how you figured it out…”

  I rush past him. “Sam, she’s in Athens.”

  He gapes at me. “And you expect to get to Greece tonight?”

  There are times he’s so brilliant that common sense is shoved out to make room for the rest of his brain. It’s what makes him and Iris work beautifully together. “Think about what you said to me and you’ll figure it out.” Bounding down the stairs, I give Josh a warm clap on the back. “Thanks for not giving up on me.”

  “Thanks for not giving up on her. Now, go see if she’s ready to come home.” With a one-two slap, Josh releases me just as Sam yells from the top of the stairs.

  “Holy crap! What the hell is she doing back at college?” Then he barks like a dog.

  There are days I wonder why in the hell I ever recruited him, and then I remember he’s the best man I know, and I give him a pass. With a shake of my head and a wave, I race out the door. Even though they waited for me to come home before they entered, the guys can lock up.

  I need to get on the road.

  * * *

  Four hours and forty minutes later, I’m pulling up to the old house Libby and Iris used to rent. And my heart settles.

  Her car’s in the driveway.

  Leaving my bag in the car, I grab the cellophane-wrapped package I stopped for along the way and slide from my truck. I walk up the front flagstone path and ring the bell. There’s music playing. I hear her tell the voice-controlled stereo to lower in volume.

  “Just a moment,” Libby’s voice comes through the door.

  My heart pounds in anticipation. The blood pumps even more furiously as I hear the chain rattle and the lock twist. The wood door swings open and there she is.

  Everything I fell in love with.

  “My life isn’t always about shitty timing, Libby.” I press forward as I shove the flowers into her hands. “Sometimes, it’s about perfect timing. Like the moment I met you and realizing I will always be yours.”

  She gasps. But before she can respond, I yank her into my arms. “Any questions?” I demand belligerently.

  A smile lifts her lips. “Just one.”

  I still. “What is it?”

  “I thought you were supposed to be some hot-as-shit PI, detective, black-ops guy, or some crap. Are you trying to tell me it took you two damn months to figure this out? I thought I was going to have to go to the Georgia/Auburn home game next weekend. Was it going to take me holding up a sign on national TV declaring where I am?”

  I decide the best way to shut her sass up in this case is to kiss her which is something I’ve been dying to do anyway. Dropping the flowers to the floor between us and wrapping both of her arms around my neck, Libby obviously agrees.

  79

  Calhoun

  Year Six - Five Years Ago from Present Day - February

  “Are you ready to talk about it?” Libby draws her knees up, brushing them against mine. We’re lying in the bedroom after an explosive kiss led me to dragging us here before she slammed the breaks on our physical reunion. “Nothing more until we talk, Cal. I just pulled myself out of the abyss. I can’t drown again. Not because of you.”

  My arm covers my eyes. It’s time for all the confessions, but I just got her love back. What’s going to happen if…

  “Cal, you can’t stop my reaction to whatever you’re going to say to me.” Libby reaches her hand over. “But your silence has caused too many problems between us.” She twists the ring on my left hand. “Think about the ripple effect of one misunderstanding. What did that almost do to us?”

  Shuddering, I roll into her, tangling our legs together. “I don’t know where to start,” I confess.

  “How about I start with this?” My heart lurches in fear. “Short of using the bathroom or food, we make a promise to not leave this house until it’s all out—no matter how much we want to. If I need a time-out, you’ll give it to me. But I won’t go any further than the backyard.”

  “Not dressed like that you won’t,” I growl.

  “Please,” she scoffs. “I’m an old woman in comparison to the kids who live around here.”

  “You’re the most beautiful woman in the world,” I declare huskily. The rose color that infuses her cheeks lends credence to the fact I have a long way to repair the foundation that my marriage is built on. “I don’t see any woman but you,” I tell her honestly.

  Taking a deep breath, she lets it out raggedly. “Can we start with the worst?”

  “Yes.” I brace, expecting her to ask me about Alliance, but my wife surprises me. Again.

  “Tell me what happened with Iris. Even though she’s called to apologize, I wouldn’t let her discuss it. It should come from you. But I have to know.” A terrible pain, the kind that is soul-deep, is emanating from her. Her closed-off face tells me she hopes I learned something in the time apart. I did. I learned the life I led wasn’t worth the price I paid for it.

  “It was spontaneous. I swear on my life. It was nothing more than a kiss of congratulations, Libby. Nothing more. Iris just retired. She said Rachel is getting too old to grow up without seeing her mother or their father. I was proud of her for making that decision.”

  “And that deserved my husband’s lips on hers?” Libby’s voice is a harsh crack in the otherwise quiet room.

  “No.”

  Her chest rises up and down with the force of her breaths. “Was Iris the only woman you ever kissed, by accident or for work?”

  “Yes, and I swear it wasn’t intentional.”

  “How do lips just meet accidentally?” Her voice is like acid.

  Even though I’ve had so long to think about it, predicting a perfect conversation and actually having one are two different things. I struggle to find the right words. “It was our anniversary and I’d knew I’d be gone—again—for an indeterminate amount of time. I was emotional. I was feeling things between us that I hadn’t felt in a long time. Or was that just me?”

  “It wasn’t just you, but Cal?”

  “Yeah?”

  “I may have missed you, us, but I didn’t break my vows.” Libby starts to roll away.

  I catch her behind the waist and pull her back. “Neither did I—not in my heart. It was a second out of time, Libs. It wasn’t until I saw the picture you sent me that I understood how you felt, how it looked from your perspective. But I need you to understand. I don’t—nor have I ever—thought of Iris that way. Sam was standing right there, Libs. Honest to God, I was talking to her, but my heart was with you. I’d just left our bed, and here was the woman closest to you who knew, well, everything. It was another level of relief knowing Iris would be there for you if something went wrong. And the next thing you know, I’d grabbed her face and kissed her. It was utterly spontaneous; my intent was not how you interprete
d it. Yes, we’re all close. We’ve had to be. But not that way. Never that way.” Her body is rigid against mine, but it isn’t trying to get away. I plunge ahead, “Kid you not, it shocked both Sam and Iris as much as it shocked me as soon as I’d did it.”

  “Sam was there?” Libby’s voice is carefully modulated.

  “Yes.”

  “In the room?”

  “He was on my computer fucking around with something. Why?”

  “Move back, please.”

  I do as she requests, not wanting to let her go. I’m so afraid my simple yet honest explanation won’t be enough, and the world will go dark again.

  She wanders over to the window. I take the time to admire the strength in her gait. “You’re stronger,” I observe quietly.

  “Much. I’ve been working with a psychologist your friend Thorn recommended.”

  “Thorn? When the hell did you talk with him?”

  “On board the Lassen. He came to see me shortly before we flew home.”

  I’m incredulous when I ask, “What did he have to say?”

  “He wanted to know if I’d managed to sleep yet. It was night three, and I still hadn’t closed my eyes for more than fifteen minutes at a time. I was terrified to.”

  “What was it like when you tried?”

  “Every time I tried, I’d wake up with my chest hurting—like I wanted to cry but didn’t feel safe enough to.”

  “You were safe, Libby,” I remind her.

  “My head was, but my heart and mind weren’t, Cal.” Her words are like a knife sliding through my ribs, swiftly and effectively removing all traces of air from my body.

  “Thorn handed me a card and said to call the number when I was ready—that I’d know when I was ready.”

  “So, what? He offered to be your sounding board?” Jealousy eats at me, bitter and acidic.

  Libby whirls around, fire in her eyes. “If it weren’t for that moment, I’d be in a different place. I wouldn’t be able to have this conversation with you. I wouldn’t even be speaking to you after years of being lied to. You owe more to your friend Thorn than you can possibly imagine.”

  “We’re not exactly friends,” I grudgingly admit.

  “That’s not the way he tells it,” Libby says, shocking me with that before she says, “The card contained the direct line to the SEAL team psychiatrist, Dr. Rhumed. At first, our sessions were daily. Then we graduated to every other day. Now, I’m down to weekly. And I’ve worked through a lot. I am stronger. I’m not the same woman I was, Cal.”

  “No one would expect you to be.” My voice is comforting.

  “No, listen to me, Cal. I’m not the same woman I used to be.” She walks back to the bed. There’s a glow about her, but it’s from the fire that burns deep inside. The light of innocence that was once there has changed. It’s been affected by the lessons she learned. She’s right. She’s changed. I quickly learn how when she starts talking again.

  “I wept for weeks over the lies, Cal. Flipping through my phone trying to pinpoint when it was you first lied to me and realizing there was never a time you spoke the truth. I cried because I allowed it, because I was done with it, done with you. And then I wondered what my life would be like without you.”

  Is this why everyone warned me to tell Libby all along? Not so she didn’t get hurt but so I didn’t end up crumbling? Or, had I changed as well? “Libby,” I plead.

  “The problem is, I can’t. I can’t blank out what I saw. And I’m left with so much conflict as a result.” Libby stalks out of the room.

  I count to ten before I follow after her. As she promised, she hasn’t left the house. She’s just standing in the kitchen. I approach slowly. “I can’t say I didn’t do it deliberately, because I did. I thought I was protecting this core of light in you that would die out if you spent day after day, month after month, worrying about where I was.” I let out a ragged breath. “I was wrong.”

  “So, now what?” She runs a hand through her hair. It’s her left one. It’s still ringless. And after four months, all I can do is pray I’ll see them back on her finger at some point.

  “Can you forgive me? For so much, Libby.” I step closer.

  “You’re going to have to be more specific.”

  “For the lies, for the pain, for not being open to the one person I should have known would have accepted me no matter what.” I begin to pray in earnest.

  She holds my life on tenterhooks while a million thoughts chase themselves across her face. I read the story of our marriage in a myriad of expressions: love, sadness, pain, hurt, love betrayal, defeat, and still love. “I forgave you before I left to come here.”

  I’m confused. Reaching for her hand, I rub my thumb over her ring finger. “Then tell me what it is you want. I need to know you. If there’s one thing I’m certain about, it’s that I can’t live without you in my life.”

  Libby contemplates our fingers before she whispers, “Are you ready to let me in—all the way in?”

  I’m about to open my mouth to agree when Libby interjects. “Be very sure before you answer. Because you’re not obligated to stay.”

  “I want to stay. I choose to be with you. You are my life.” And it hits me like a two-by-four that if I’d told her the truth, she’d have already known this. And never questioned it.

  “I will always love you, Calhoun Sullivan. But my love isn’t an obligation,” she warns me. “I want it all—the good, the bad, the honesty I should have had from the first damn moment we stood here and you asked me out. If you can’t give it to me, then there’s the door.” She points at the door behind me.

  Slipping my hand into the back pocket of my jeans, I pull out my cell phone. I tear my eyes away from Libby’s long enough to dial a number I have memorized by heart.

  It rings once.

  Twice.

  Yarborough picks up on the third ring. “Cal? What is it?”

  “I found Libby.” My eyes go back to her mutinous face. “I need you to talk to your contact at DoD and get her clearance paperwork expedited so we can read her on.”

  I barely hear, “It’s about fucking time,” in my ear because I’m already hanging up the phone. I slip it back into my pocket.

  “Even if I can tell you most of what we do, there will be times I still can’t get into detail,” I warn her.

  “I’ve lived through what you do, Cal. I think I’m in a good position to set up a scoring system now for how bad things are going to be,” she drawls.

  “That mouth.” I just shake my head. “From the moment I first saw you, you made me want to smile, you taught me to laugh. I never knew until I almost lost you that you could make me cry, Libby.”

  “Same goes.”

  “So.” I hold my hands out to my side. “Where do we go from here?” I hold my breath, afraid of the answer.

  “I get over missing the man I thought you were while learning the man you are. And somehow, we find a way because the kind of love we have is worth fighting for.” Bashfully, she looks away. “You taught me that.”

  “I did?” I’m incredulous.

  “Yes.” Libby comes into my space. “The entire time I was on the Sea Force, I kept remembering you trying to get through to me, and I realized if you didn’t love me, you would have just walked away. So, I know there’s a reason to fight. It’s right here.” Libby lays her hand on my chest.

  “Christ, I love you.” I pull her tight against my body.

  Then, I hear words I never thought I’d hear again whispered in my ear. “I love you too, Cal. Always.”

  80

  Present Day

  Calhoun

  Dr. Powell puts the file in front of him on the coffee table and sits back. “Is there any difference when you look back on it now?” Dr. Powell asks Libby.

  “Every year that passes, I feel more blessed to have the life I do. There were so many things before I used to be worried about—everyday stressors—that are meaningless now.”

  “Can you gi
ve me an example?”

  “Who’s coming home late, who’s making dinner? Did my dry cleaning come back with any stains? Did a client pay me on time? Hold on. Can you edit out the last comment? I really need my clients to pay me on time,” Libby says cheekily.

  All of us laugh. Dr. Powell leans forward and makes a note on his pad. “I’m surprised you haven’t asked for much else to be edited out before now,” he admits.

  “Probably because I remember your integrity from the first time you interviewed Cal and me. I truly suspect, Dr. Powell, you wanted to know how we were doing as much for your own comfort as you wanted footage for the anniversary special.”

  The network interviewer, a renowned psychiatrist, twists his head toward me. “You married a smart woman, Cal.”

  “I’m well aware. I’m blessed, but not because of that,” I respond.

  “Why?” Dr. Powell asks.

  I brush my lips across the top of Libby’s head. “Somehow, I managed to get her to fall in love with me twice.”

  “It wasn’t that hard,” Libby murmurs.

  “After everything?” Dr. Powell’s voice is incredulous, echoing the sentiment in my heart.

  “Not really. Because at his core, it wasn’t superficial things that made me fall in love with Cal. It was the knowledge that I knew from the beginning he was the missing piece to my heart. Once I knew our marriage was his first priority and the communication issues between us were resolved, I was still in love with the same man.”

  I don’t know if it’s possible to hold her any tighter, but I try. “Like I said, I’m blessed.”

  “What are you doing now, Cal? It was mentioned your company was sold?”

  Shifting, I drop my arm from Libby. “I may need to stop some of your questions,” I warn.

  “Of course,” Dr. Powell agrees.

  “It took about a year. Karl and I worked with the team to split off our part of Alliance—which included most of our team and part of the administrative staff. We sold it to an investigation agency based out of New York. I now head up their DC office.”