And then there was his epilepsy. Even if she grew to love him anywhere close to how he loved her, could he ask her to marry him? Maybe if he didn’t feel so helpless every time a chill struck without warning. Maybe if the seizures were under control. But that was a big maybe.
“Maybe that’s a question I shouldn’t have asked,” Niall said quietly. “Sorry. It’s none of my business.”
“It’s...complicated” was all Shane could think to say.
“You’re not sure you love her enough for forever?”
“That’s not it.”
“Then what? You think she doesn’t love you?” Niall kept his eyes on the road, but there was something in the set of his jaw that tipped Shane off that his brother refused to believe it. “I saw the way she looked at you Friday night, Essbee,” he said, using the nickname from their childhood only he used, the initials of Shane’s given names—S.B. “And I heard her say you weren’t doing this.” Niall darted a glance at him. “Seemed pretty obvious to me, and it didn’t take any special black-ops skills to see it, either.”
Shane desperately wanted it to be true, but... “It’s not that easy.”
His brother grunted, but Shane wasn’t sure exactly what he meant by it. A long silence was broken by “She try to change your mind about today?”
“No,” he said, remembering. “She didn’t.” He’d thought she was going to. When she’d shown up in Niall’s office Friday night, he’d been sure she was going to force him to choose between her and his plan to catch the hit man. And he’d wondered ever since—if she cared for him the way he wanted her to—why she hadn’t. She wouldn’t have changed his mind, but...
“That’s one brave woman.”
“What do you mean?”
“Thought you were smarter than that, Essbee.”
“Just spill it.”
“Takes a brave woman to stand by and let someone she loves risk his life without trying to stop him. Like Mom. She loves us—and it would kill her to lose one of us—but she never tried to stop us from being ‘one.’”
The reference to Edward Everett Hale’s famous “I am one” quotation about making a difference in the world streaked through Shane’s consciousness like a lightning bolt. Their parents had thought the idea was so important the entire quotation hung above the fireplace at home—almost before Shane could read, he could recite it by heart. I am only one, but I am one. I cannot do everything, but I can do something. And I will not let what I cannot do interfere with what I can do. And by the grace of God, I will.
“You really think...?” He couldn’t finish the question.
“Hell yeah.”
Overlaid against his brother’s emphatic agreement, he suddenly heard Carly saying, I owe you another apology. And when he’d asked why, she’d said, I can’t tell you... I’m too ashamed.
Ashamed because she loved him and wanted to keep him safe, wanted him to sit back and let someone else take the risk, even if that was the coward’s way? Ashamed because for a brief moment she’d wanted him to be less than the man he was? And when she’d realized what she was doing, she’d backpedaled and apologized?
Then the words she’d uttered just before he’d left today flashed into his mind. I know why you’re doing this, and I’m not trying to stop you. I want to, but I won’t.
Adrenaline surged through every part of his body at the realization. If Niall was right, then Carly didn’t just care for him, she loved him enough to let him do without protest what he had to do...because he couldn’t do less. Because he was “one.”
* * *
Students filed noisily into Adams Hall, accompanied by faculty and the general public. If the weather had been better or worse, the crowd would have been smaller. A warm, sunny day would have driven most people to the parks to enjoy the extra-early gift of springtime weather. A snowy or rainy day would have kept many of them home with a good book or watching a basketball game on TV. But the weather—sunny and cold—was perfect for maximum attendance at the panel discussion on a topic that was polarizing, both on campus and with the voting public.