Chapter One

It was a typical mid-October night in Chicago, Illinois, and Shannon Rivers was getting ready for her date. Her free-spirited extrovert roommate, Leah, lounged in the doorway, keeping her company as Shannon tried to figure out what to wear.

“Ten dates already, huh?”

“Yeah,” Shannon confirmed.

“Think tonight’s the night to finally… you know…?” Leah teased.

“Stop that,” Shannon admonished, even as she giggled and blushed.

“And for the record, probably not.”

“Seriously?” Leah’s tone turned incredulous as she came and sat on Shannon’s bed. “Still not yet?”

Shannon shrugged.

“I’m not ready.”

“Robert’s tall, built, cute, and is steadily employed,” Leah reminded her. “Pretty good catch.”

“I know,” Shannon sighed. “And he’s very attentive and sweet. I just don’t…,” and she trailed off.

She’d met Robert at the coffee shop on campus two months earlier. She was almost done with her double Bachelor’s in Finance and Accounting. He’d just graduated with his Master’s in Business and was studying for the CPA exam when he wasn’t working at Creach & Langford, one of the most prestigious investment firms in the nation.

He was handsome, smart, funny, charming, and completely besotted with her.

The fact that she felt no spark whatsoever when he kissed her bothered her a great deal.

“Don’t, what?” Leah asked.

“Think of him like that,” Shannon confessed, then sighed again.

“He’s a great guy, and I like spending time with him. But something’s missing, Leah. I’m just not attracted to him that way, at all, and I have no idea why. Unless that changes somehow, I don’t know how much longer I will see him. I know he wants more than just a goodnight kiss.”

“If that’s really how it is, you should tell him, Shannon,” Leah said somberly. “You can’t help what you don’t feel. It’s not anybody’s fault. It’s just the way things go sometimes.”

Shannon nodded.

“Yeah. And like I said, he’s a great guy. Robert deserves someone who can be more than a friend to him.”

“So, talk to him. And after that, give him my number. I think he’s hot, and I’d be happy to ‘more than friend’ him as many times as humanly possible.”

Leah grinned as she watched Shannon’s eyebrows vault skyward.

“Girl, please. I’m kidding. You know I’d never do that. I mean, depending on the circumstances, I probably would, but not to you. Just trying to get you to loosen up and at least smile.”

“You’re talking like I haven’t seen you in action after a few too many Jell-O shots,” Shannon teased.

“I like to play the field. What’s your point?” Leah said primly.

Each of them managed to keep a straight face for a few moments before they both roared with laughter.

***

When Robert picked her up, he looked exhausted and tense. Shannon chalked it up to all the hours he’d been putting in.

He’s been working so hard lately, she thought. He deserves a night of fun. Our talk can wait a day or two.

Over dinner they both slowly relaxed - until he brought a tiny square box out of hiding, and Shannon’s heart leapt into her throat.

What is he doing… is he… oh, no.

That was followed immediately by enormous relief when he opened it and showed her its contents, saying simply, “I saw this today, and thought of you.”

It was a small silver locket, intricately engraved with a swirling pattern.

“Please accept this, as a token of friendship,” he continued softly, and his eyes told her that he wanted more, but would settle for being friends - for now.

Shannon didn’t want to hurt his feelings, so she accepted, and he smiled as she fastened the braided chain around her neck.

“It looks good on you,” Robert observed, and she blushed.

“Now, how about a movie? The one we were talking about the other day is showing at the theater not far from here. Show starts at seven. You want to go?”

She smiled and nodded.

***

“That was quite an ending! Didn’t see that twist coming at all,” Robert announced as they left the movie theater a little over two hours later.

“Me either,” Shannon agreed. “What do you want to do next? It’s only nine o’clock.”

“Hmm,” he pondered. “How about that new nightclub that just opened? Wanna stop in, see what all the fuss is about?”

She shrugged.

“Clubs aren’t really my thing.”

“Come on, it’ll be fun,” he goaded, and smiled the smile he knew she couldn’t resist.

“Oh, all right,” she conceded, and couldn’t help but grin back.

She realized just before he opened the passenger side door for her that she’d left her purse in the theater.

“I need to go back in, I forgot my purse. Be right back.”

“No problem. I’ll pull up to the curb and pick you up,” he answered.

She smiled, nodded, then pivoted and started to walk back toward the movie theater’s entrance. Behind her Shannon heard Robert’s driver side door open and close, then the cranking noise as he started the car.

She’d gone about fifty feet when suddenly the earth trembled, followed by the loudest boom she’d ever heard. The next thing she knew she was flying forward through the air, landing with a massive thud face down almost twenty feet from where she’d been. She gasped, disoriented, trying to draw in a breath, but the impact had knocked the wind out of her.

Shannon struggled to pull her arms in and under her chest to leverage herself up off the ground, and she felt something slapping at her back.

“Hold still,” a voice said. But he sounded muffled, miles away, and she shook her head, not comprehending what he’d said.

“Hold still, your shirt’s on fire,” the stranger yelled, and used his jacket to smother the flames licking at her clothing.

Once he’d put out the fire, he crouched down next to her head where she could see him more clearly in the dark. Deep brown eyes, filled with worry, were staring intently into her aquamarine ones, and correctly read shock and confusion in her gaze.

“Are you hurt?” he asked, and she realized she had to watch his lips move to understand the question, because she couldn’t hear much of anything at all.

“Don’t…think…so,” she wheezed, still trying to regain her breath.

Slowly, he aided her in turning over, then sitting up. The motion, combined with the smells of gasoline, melted plastic, charred cotton and burned flesh, assaulted her senses and made her nauseous, and she leaned to one side and vomited.

The wave of nausea finally passed, and as Shannon sat upright again, she blinked rapidly several times, trying to make sure the scene unfolding in front of her was real.

It was Robert’s car.

Or what’s left of it, anyway, her brain observed.

Still sitting in the same parking spot.

Kind of.

Mangled, and in flames…

What the hell just happened?

The Good Samaritan beside her stood up and waved his arms frantically at the ambulance and fire trucks pulling into the lot.

“Over here!” he cried out. “She’s hurt!”

“Robert,” she croaked, looking up at the man who had helped her and noticing he was wearing a mall security uniform. “Where’s Robert?”

The guard looked down at her, his expression full of concern, and Shannon squinted to try to see his lips better so she could understand the answer.

“I don’t know.”

I have to find him, her brain screamed.

The man tried to get her to remain where she was and wait for the approaching EMTs, but she shook him off.

Shannon struggled to her feet, staggered four steps forward, and slumped toward the ground as unconsciousness took her.

Luckily, the first paramedic was only steps away, so he raced forward and caught her, then scooped her up and placed her on the gurney his partner had just wheeled over.

***

Her next awareness was sometime later, lying on her side in the back of an ambulance, being tended to by one of the emergency workers.

“Can you hear me?” he asked her.

“I know you’re speaking to me, because I can see your mouth moving,” she said loudly. “But I can’t hear you.”

He held up a finger, then scribbled on a notepad and handed it to her.

That’s because both your eardrums are ruptured from the blast, the note said.

“Blast? Are you talking about an explosion?”

He nodded.

“Seriously?”

He nodded again.

A knock on the back of the ambulance, then the door opening, revealed the same security guard that had come to her aid earlier. He held up her purse where she could see it.

This yours? he mimed to her, and she nodded. He held it out to the paramedic, who took it and handed it to her.

“Thank you,” she told him, and he gave her a smile and a thumbs-up, then closed the ambulance door.

“Anything else wrong with me?” Shannon asked the paramedic, and he took the pad back and wrote some more, then showed it to her again.

A probable concussion – you’ve got a hell of a goose egg on your head. Scrapes on your chin, nose, torso, hands and knees, and you’ve got some second-degree burns on your back. All in all, you got really lucky.

She reached up gingerly and winced as she felt a huge knot bulging prominently in the dead center of her forehead.

“Where’s Robert? Is he okay?” she asked.

And she noticed the man hesitate.

“What aren’t you telling me?”

He sighed, then slowly drew his pen again across the page.

He’s still in the car... I’m so sorry.

Shannon’s emotions spilled over in an instant, and the paramedic took her hand and held it as she sobbed.

“I want to see him,” she exclaimed.

He squeezed her hand to get her attention, and when she raised her tear-stained face up to look at him, he made sure she understood what he’d written next when he showed it to her.

NO. Trust me. You REALLY don’t want to see that.

Her eyes went wide with realization, and the realization made her nauseous again. Her caretaker anticipated it and was ready, holding back her long auburn hair as she retched violently once more.

Once the nausea was gone, Shannon Rivers lay on her side again. Her right hand was wrapped tightly around the tiny locket she’d now wear in remembrance of the sweet man she just hadn’t been able to love, and she shed silent tears en route to the hospital.