“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.
Chapter 24
Shannon
I never thought my mother capable of something so duplicitous, but she just admitted to hiring someone to pretend to be my stalker, all under the guise of doing something to make me happy. Of course, getting together with Ace does make me happy, so it’s hard to be mad about something that wound up making one of my dreams come true.
I’m still confused about a few things, though.
“Why would Sandra have destroyed my apartment that way if she wasn’t supposed to do anything but annoy me a little?”
Mom hesitates. “I’m honestly not sure. She acted like she was your friend and really excited to help in this matchmaking effort, but the longer it went on, the more intense she got.”
“You didn’t tell her what I do for a living, did you?” Ace asks cautiously.
Mom shakes her head. “No, of course not. I’m conniving but not stupid. I would never do anything to blow your cover or put your life in danger.”
“Just mine,” I say dryly.
My mother nods sadly. “I’m sorry. I’m just a bored old woman with more time than sense these days.”
