“I’ll let you extend my apologies, then.”
“I’ll do that. Goodbye, Paul.”
“What did you do?”
Victor stood behind his desk when Stephanie escorted Avery into his office the next morning.
“Hello, Avery.”
Stephanie ducked out of the room, but if Victor was laying bets, he’d place one on her standing close to the door to overhear the conversation.
“I swear to God, Victor, if I find out you were playing her, I will kick your ass.”
The term Wade used for Avery, the blonde pit bull, flashed in his head.
He looked at the small baby bump that was just starting to pop out.
Pregnant blonde pit bull.
He decided the desk between them was probably a good thing.
“We had a fight. I’ll make it up to her.” He was giving her some space since she wouldn’t take his phone calls.
Avery took a step forward, placed both hands on his desk. “And how do you plan on doing that when she’s left the country?”
Victor was vaguely aware he was staring. “She what?”
“Africa, or Brazil . . . someplace that probably doesn’t have running water. What did you do?”
His head was racing. “Slow down. What are you talking about?”
“She went to her sister’s . . . who is some tree-hugging do-gooder living in a hut somewhere. Does that sound like something Shannon would be good at?”
He started to answer and Avery cut him off. “No. She isn’t. She’s fragile and delicate and needs protection. And you did something, so give it up. What was it?”
The emotional roller coaster that was Avery standing in front of him was something that needed a careful hand.
“I believed the newspapers.”
“You . . . you what?”
“About her ex-husband.”
Avery gasped. “Paul orchestrated the whole thing. How could you be so stupid?”
Yeah, he’d asked himself that question for the past twenty-four hours. “Jet lag?”
Avery tossed her hands in the air. “Great! That’s just great. Shannon finally breaks her sexual sabbatical for a man who doesn’t trust her any farther than he can throw her.”
He’d ask about the sabbatical later, right now he wanted to know more about Africa. “She’s in Africa?”
“I don’t know where she is. No one knows where she is. She ran off. Do you know how unlike Shannon that is? Me, yes . . . Trina, check. We’re the runners. Shannon is the rock. She never runs. She thinks and considers her options in quiet silence. Until you.” Avery blew out a breath and rubbed her stomach.
Victor suddenly felt the pull of his protective male sex. “Avery, please calm down.”
She snapped her head his way.
He warded her off with a display of his palms. “This can’t be good for your baby. I know you’re upset, I get it. I’ll fix it. I promise I will. But if something happens to you, Shannon is never going to give me the chance.”
Avery took a couple of steps, turned, and sat in the chair.
He waited for her to take a few breaths before he sat opposite her and spoke as calmly as he could.
“How can we find out where Shannon’s sister lives?”
“Reed is working on it.” Avery opened her eyes, which sparkled with unshed tears. He hated to see a woman cry. “Did you know that today is Shannon’s birthday?”
Victor frowned. “No.” That was something he should have known.
Avery nodded. “What a mess she must be. Between last week, the papers . . . you . . . her birthday.”
Victor stopped trying to pick apart the fact that he didn’t realize today was Shannon’s birthday and analyzed Avery’s words. “What was last week?”
“Corrie vandalizing her house. A late night visit to the ER . . . ,” Avery said as if he should have known what she was talking about.
“Whoa, back up. Corrie did what?”
“She wasn’t positive it was Corrie, but yeah, she was pretty sure.”
It was Victor’s turn to feel his blood pressure rise. “Can you start at the beginning? I don’t know anything about this.”
When Avery completed the tale of rocks, windows, and stitches, Victor turned hard. No wonder Shannon was so upset and unreasonable when he’d asked her for an explanation. Here she was, trying to save his worries by keeping the situation away from him while he was away on work and unable to do anything about it, and here he was . . . not trusting her.
Such an asshole.
“She was even going back on the pill for you. Do you know that?” Avery was in tears now. “For over a year she’s been talking about how much she wants a baby, and then you come along and she’s like, ‘No, can’t risk an accident and him running away.’” Avery looked at her stomach. “I told her it wasn’t all that. Emotions all over the place, the need to pee all the time. And the morning sickness. Such a mess.”
“Did you drive here?” he asked.
She grabbed a tissue from his desk, blew her nose with a nod.
He pulled his cell phone from his pocket and dialed Liam’s number. “Let me get you a ride home.”
As soon as Liam tucked his wife into his car, Victor called Reed.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Shannon pushed her toes into the sand of the Mediterranean waters. Her sister sat by her side, a blanket covering their shoulders. She’d forgotten how alike the two of them were. Angie had put on a few pounds and her hair was shorter than Shannon remembered, but she was the same.
When Shannon arrived in Spain, she crashed on Angie’s couch for six hours. Now it was dusk, her birthday almost a memory, and the two of them watched the sunset.
Shannon explained the past few months of her life and Angie listened.
“Why did you marry Paul?” Angie finally asked when Shannon had run out of words.
She studied her pink toes, realized she was in need of a pedicure. “Money,” she finally revealed.
Angie blew out a breath.
“Freedom, a way out from under Mom and Dad.”
Angie looked away.
“Don’t look so shocked. It wasn’t a lot different from what you did.”
“How can you say that?” Angie asked.
“You ran away, found a cause . . . to escape them. Tell me I’m wrong and I’ll believe you.”
Angie shrugged but didn’t deny her.
“I wasn’t that brave. I finished college with a major they approved of and set out to follow the photographer dreams I’d envisioned while in school. Maybe I would have found success if I was also a journalist or spent my summers as an intern for the paper. But I didn’t, and the back room studio I started barely put food on my plate. Mom and Dad refused to help, and I’m not afraid to say that when it comes to my life skills and living on next to nothing, I’m ill prepared.”
“So you sold out.” For once, Angie didn’t sound as if she were accusing her of a deadly sin. More like acceptance.
“I did. I sought after a solution that would give me the financial freedom I needed at the same time I would make Mom and Dad proud. The difference was, I knew my marriage would end in divorce.”
Angie pulled away, stared at her. “You played him?”
Shannon shook her head. “God, no. I don’t think I would even know how to do that. It was an arrangement. His idea, actually. Two years, a quiet divorce . . . I got the money, and with a wife at his side, Paul won the seat as governor.”
Angie shoved her shoulder with her own. “Holy cow, Shannon. That’s brilliant.”
“Yeah, but then I went and fell in love with the bastard. Not so brilliant. I’ve spent the first half of my thirties pining for a man I can’t have, and now that I find one I can, he doesn’t trust me.”
“Does Victor know about your marriage with Paul? The truth about it, I mean?”
“Not completely. I’ve hinted. I’ve been open with him about everything else. The details of why Paul and I married are irrelevant.”
“If Victor thinks you’re still in love with your ex, then your previous husband would be a pretty big obstacle.”
“I told him it was over. I meant that. And Victor chose to listen to the lies of the newspapers instead of coming to me first. He doesn’t trust me, Angie.” And where were they if there wasn’t trust? On different sides of the planet, that’s where.
Angie leaned her head against Shannon’s shoulder. “Don’t you think you might be overreacting just a little?”
“Have you ever been in love?” Shannon asked.
“Yeah.”
“And when it ended, how did you feel?”
“Like my world was over.”
“Exactly.”
They sat in silence for a little while. “The world is still here, you know.”
Shannon leaned against her sister. “I know. But I’m going to ignore it for a little while. Don’t worry, I won’t take up residency on your couch forever. I need to adjust my lens and make things come into focus again.”
Angie nudged her. “Will a stupid amount of tequila help?”
Shannon laughed. “Maybe not a stupid amount, but I think a couple of shots might be in order.”
Angie pushed to her feet and reached out for Shannon to follow. “I know the perfect place where birthday shots are always on the house.”
“Tequila . . . I have a feeling this might not end well.”
Angie laughed. “I’ll take care of you. I owe you.”
Shannon brushed sand off her butt once she stood. “How do you figure that?”
“Mom and Dad picked on you when I ran off. You took on the burden of pleasing them, and I skipped that altogether.”
“You were the rebel, I was the peacemaker. It’s just how we’re wired.”
Angie shook her head. “No, I acted like a child and you acted like the adult. I’m not sure either of us were right, but there is no changing it now.”