The War Council

By Ann Shepphird

Ever wonder what it would be like to be able to hire the team from "Mission: Impossible" to solve your relationship woes? A young communications professor attempts to make that happen in "The War Council."
After the love of her life leaves her for a job on the other side of the world, Professor Maggie McGrew is devastated. To Maggie, h

• Language: English
• Publisher: 4 Horsemen Publications
• Release date: Sep 1, 2021
• ISBN: 9781644502570

Ann Shepphird

In her 20+ years as a writer and editor, Ann Shepphird has covered everything from travel and sports to gardening and food to architecture and design for a variety of publications. She has also put her skills to work writing ad copy for California-based animal rescue groups.Now Ann is tackling her favorite genres-rom-coms and cozy mysteries-which is especially appropriate as her first love in life was spending Saturday afternoons reading Nancy Drew mysteries.The rom-coms are part of the University Chronicles series, which are based on Ann's days as a college-level communications instructor, while the Destination Murder mysteries combine her experiences as a travel journalist with her brief stint working for a private investigator (a job she got because of her love of Sue Grafton novels).Ann lives in Santa Monica, California, with her long-time partner, Jeff, and their furry companions Melody and Winnie. When she's not writing, Ann is most likely to be found on a tennis court or in her garden.

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Table of Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

About the Author

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The War Council

University Chronicles Book 1

Copyright © 2021 Ann Shepphird. All rights reserved.

4 Horsemen Publications, Inc.

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Typesetting by Michelle Cline

Editor JM Paquette

All rights to the work within are reserved to the author and publisher. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, scanning, or otherwise, except as permitted under Section 107 or 108 of the 1976 International Copyright Act, without prior written permission except in brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. Please contact either the Publisher or Author to gain permission.

This book is meant as a reference guide. All characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. All brands, quotes, and cited work respectfully belong to the original rights holders and bear no affiliation to the authors or publisher.

Library of Congress Control Number: 2021941364

Paperback ISBN-13: 978-1-64450-258-7

Audiobook ISBN-13: 978-1-64450-253-2

Ebook ISBN-13: 978-1-64450-257-0

For the friends and family that make up my own personal war council.

Thank you for all your love and support.

Chapter One

MAGGIE

Okay. Let’s get one thing straight—it’s not that I feel that I have to justify myself. Because I don’t. I just want you to understand how this all came about. Because, really, it was a logical decision. Ver y logical.

We’re talking about love here. Now many may argue that love is inherently illogical. Sweet mystery of love and all that crap. But that doesn’t necessarily mean that we have to be illogical when it comes to our relationships. There are just so many signs out there that people are straining for some sort of logic. They turn to self-help books, therapists, relationship blogs, even Goop, for god’s sake. But, let’s face it—they’re all inherently impersonal.

So, we turn to our friends. How many hours have we spent listening to our friends’ relationship woes? How many hours have we spent pouring our hearts out to our friends about our own relationships? Hours. Many many hours. Many many friends. And yet, how good is the advice? I mean, really? How many times have you done something incredibly stupid just because a friend advised it? I have. I will admit it. Sometimes love makes us so crazy that we don’t know how to act—and so we act stupidly. That’s just my point.

But what if there was a way to face love logically? Armed with a plan that had at least a modicum of logic and reason? See, that’s the real problem. When we fall in love, we lose all sense of logic and reason. So where should we turn to receive advice that is logical and reasonable? To other lovesick puppies? Or to a team of experts whose sole purpose it is to be logical and reasonable when you’re not capable of either? To a therapist? Or to a group of specialists who don’t just listen to your problems but become actively involved in them with you? A professional council of experts who are paid to be on your side. I’m talking about a business. A desperately needed service. Are you following me here?

This idea, simple as it may seem, did not come about immediately. It evolved. But, once again, it just seemed so right.

Maybe it would help to give you a little background. I suppose my background should come first. Not that I run around talking about myself all the time. I don’t. Really. But it might clarify how I came to this idea. I was 30. There is something about turning 30 that forces a re-examination of one’s life. I mean, it’s the end of an era, right? Not that I really enjoyed my 20s. Most of it was the shits. Constantly growing, constantly changing, constantly figuring out what the hell I wanted to do with my life. I’m still not sure I know. Do we ever know? But I had done a lot of examining. And most of my non-career examining had to do with relationships. It started the first time I fell in love.

I fell in love—real love, real down-to-the-cellular-level love—for the first time somewhat later than most, I suppose. I was 25. Like I said, a little late. Maybe it’s better to go through it in your teens when your hormones make you an idiot anyway. Maybe it’s not. It was nice to be a little formed before the big fall because, let’s face it, love fucks us up majorly. We search for it so desperately, and yet when it hits—wow. I don’t think we’re ready.

So anyway, I was 25 and swept off my feet. God, I hate that expression. Like I’m some Cinderella obsessive or something. I’m not. Still, the phrase fits. I’m not sure we ever feel the same as we do with that first love. It was amazing. Overwhelming. Liberating, really. I changed—or, at least, I felt like I changed. I began to believe in myself. I felt beautiful, sexy, intelligent—like I could do anything. Everything changed. Those feelings of being beautiful, sexy, and intelligent translated to how I carried myself, and it was like the world responded. I even got off my butt, went back to my graduate program, and got my Ph.D.

The first year with Bill… Yeah, I know. Bill. Sucks, doesn’t it? But consider the alternatives: William, Willie, Billy—they all suck. Anyway, that first year was fabulous. Well, not always fabulous. Every month or so I would get a speech about how he wasn’t ready for marriage. Like I was? This kind of pissed me off. I was 25 years old—we were both 25—so who said I wanted to marry him? I do think it is rather egotistical—sexist, even—of men to think every woman wants to trap a man into marriage.

That’s why this idea of mine is really NOT gender specific. But we’ll get into that later.

Really, though, the first year was great. Mostly because I was really good at giving Bill space when he needed it. It was kind of natural. I’ve always been kind of a space nut myself. So, whenever I got the speech about marriage and space and whatever, I said, Fine. Take all the space you want, and he didn’t want the space, and everything was fine.

The problems started when Bill was about to get his degree. He was finishing his master’s in journalism, and I kind of knew he wouldn’t stay in Berkeley after he graduated, but I didn’t want to think about it. Unfortunately, he thought about it a lot. That was another speech I got. He was always saying how special we were together and how much he loved me, but that it couldn’t last because he was going to leave soon. He had big plans for his life, and he wasn’t going to let a little thing like love get in his way. I was okay with it. Sure. And, of course, I will admit that I was warned. That didn’t mean it wasn’t a shock when he actually left.

Bill got a job at a wire service in Tokyo, and I was destroyed. The thing is it’s not as if I wouldn’t have dropped everything to go with him. I would have. See, that’s how sick love makes us. I would have left everything I had built to follow him. But he didn’t want me. He said he loved me, but he had to do this on his own. I said I understood but really I didn’t.

I guess I just see things in very simple terms. Or I used to. I just think that if two people love each other, they should be together. Bill didn’t think it was that easy. His parents had divorced when he was young, and he thought that love led to marriage, which led to fights, which led to divorce. He didn’t want anything holding him back in his life, and unfortunately, he saw me as holding him back. More male ego if you ask me. Again, I never said that I wanted to marry him and strap him down with kids and a Volvo. I have never been the white picket-fence type. I just wanted to be with him. Simple. But, not for him. So, we were not to be. This is when I did those really stupid and embarrassing things. But we don’t need to go into them here, do we?

Like I said, I was destroyed. I didn’t understand how someone could say they loved me more than anything else in the world, that we were special, that we had everything in common—and then leave. I did a lot of growing up. I sure wonder how teenagers get over a first love when I was heartbroken at 28 while finishing my dissertation. Suddenly, I wasn’t so sure that I was beautiful, sexy, or intelligent. I thought he made me those things, and without him, I was nothing. I know—dumb, huh?

It was then that I started my analysis of relationships. And the phone calls began. And the emails and texts. My friends became sick of me. So, I moved to new friends. Then a therapist. I had to get things straight in my mind. How could this have happened? What did I do? What could I have done? More phone calls. More emails. More texts. But the answer was always the same. Nothing. I did nothing. I could do nothing.

It was then I realized how much timing has to do with relationships. Bill didn’t leave because of me. He left because of him. He was selfish. He never even considered my feelings. I had nothing to do with his decision or his life. I then realized I could be beautiful, sexy, and intelligent without him. Fuck him. I started to wonder how I could have given him so much power. How could someone place her entire self-esteem in the hands of another person? Especially the egotistical male creature?

Sorry. I know I said that this would not be gender specific. But, really, Bill was thinking about himself, and I was thinking about Bill and what I thought he made me. I gave him a lot of power. And, to his credit, he never asked for that power.

It was then that I realized that this is what relationships are all about. Power. Who has it. And who has given it up.

If relationships are about power, then it stands to reason that the more people we have on our side, the better, right? That’s why we call our friends. We explain our side. They agree. We feel better. We have ammunition.

Aha. Power. Ammunition. Sounds like a battle, right? Right. Battle of the sexes. All’s fair in love and war. Clichés, yes, but there’s a reason they’re clichés. So instead of having a bunch of friends on our side, what if we could have experts on our side? A War Council, so to speak? What if our ammunition came from seasoned specialists who analyzed our relationship and sent us back out with strategies designed for success? What if these experts went further and became part of the scenario? You know, like the team from Mission: Impossible. Huh? Still with me?

It was then that I noticed the obsession so many people have with marriage. As a goal. Not finding somebody to spend your life with, to love, to be your best friend—no, to marry. To experience the convention of marriage. I mean, look at the success of shows like The Bachelor and The Bachelorette. I began to notice how many weddings I attended where the people didn’t seem to love each other as much as the show they were putting on. God, how many bridal showers—an archaic and sickening convention if ever there was one—have I attended where all the women did was go gah-gah over the rocks on their fingers while bitching about their husbands?

I noticed how many of the self-help books and blogs and conferences had to do with coercing someone into marriage. One even goes so far as to tell women not to sleep with the man until he’s proposed. Heck, even my grandmother used to say you don’t buy a shoe until you’ve tried it on (and we won’t even talk about what happens in those Fantasy Rooms on The Bachelor). How many times do even astrology columns mention things like attention revolves around marital status? I’ll tell you: Lots.

Okay. So. We know it’s an obsession. We know people would like more ammunition in the power struggle in their relationships, and that for most, the final goal is marriage. Well, there you have it: a War Council whose aim is to coerce a partner into the ultimate commitment. The business opportunities seemed boundless. We could provide a necessary service. Those stupid self-help books were making a fortune. And this was SO much better.

Cynical, yes. But, hey, these are cynical times.

The first time I tried the idea out on the public, so to speak, was at one of Kathy’s dinner parties. Kathy is my best friend—if those are still around. We have known each other for years. Got our doctorates at UC Berkeley together, although hers is in psychology and mine’s organizational communications. Kathy is one of those people who has seemingly sailed through life. I don’t know how she does it. Always even keel, always thinks the best of people, just kind of floats. I’d use the word mellow if I didn’t hate it so much.

Naturally, we are total opposites. I can be somewhat mercurial. And, okay, I’ll admit that I can make things more dramatic than they need to be. Kathy is pretty good at keeping me semi-stable—one of those friends who didn’t give up on me during the whole post-Bill thing.

Kathy, naturally, is married to her college sweetheart Brian. They met in Psych 10, discovered they had everything in common, and haven’t been apart since. It’s enough to make you want to vomit. They have two kids (naturally). A boy and a girl (naturally). I feel a little sorry for the kids, though. You would think having two psychologists for parents would be enough to send someone over the edge. But they seem okay.

So, anyway, Kathy loves to throw dinner parties. Some sort of nesting instinct or something. I don’t know. They’ve got one of those great old Victorians in San Francisco (bought for a song at the right time and fixed up themselves, naturally) and love to have people over. They throw great dinner parties. Always seem to find the most fascinating people to invite. And they usually include me, which is nice. Nurturing types, you know.

This particular dinner party had a lot of close friends. People I had known for years at UC Berkeley.

I had been playing with this War Council idea for weeks and, after a few glasses of wine, decided to try it out on this crowd. They didn’t treat it as seriously as I might’ve liked. Randy, a film scholar, started espousing romantic lines from some 1940s Bette Davis classic, while Monique, a women’s studies professor, talked about love as evidence of the patriarchal society’s attempts to put women in their place. I always loved listening to Monique talk like that because she’s one of those tall drop-dead gorgeous women who have men, women—everybody, really—eating out of her hand. Not that women’s studies professors can’t be stunners. I get that. But let’s just say that with her mane of blond hair and tendency to wear deep red lipstick, the first impression she gives off is pretty much the opposite of everything that comes out of her mouth. And, yes, again, I get it. That’s the point. But, let’s be honest: It was a bit of a dichotomy.

Anyway, others piped in with their viewpoints and made some jokes, but then they moved on to another topic. I’ll admit I wanted more, but to pressure them seemed futile. As I watched them all talk, I started to scan the table, thinking about what each had said and stood for in this game—this war game—of love.

Across from me sat Kathy. Happily married. Counsels students on campus. Next to her was Nick, a friend of Brian’s. I didn’t know much about him. But then there was Hallie, a political science professor and one of the most competitive people I knew. Randy, her husband—a film archivist and true romantic—sat next to her. Then there was Mike, the new Cal rugby coach. And Monique. Brian sat next to me.

As I stared at them, a light bulb went off. This group of people would be perfect. Each could represent a different expert for the War Council. I didn’t see Nick or Brian fitting in. Brian is a research psychologist more interested in studying lab rats and their reaction to light as it relates to seasonal affective disorder than love and relationships, while Nick said something about studying French literature so neither of them had any practical expertise for the War Council.

But the others did. The others did! Here I was