Force of Nature (34 page)

“Oh,” Annie said, grabbing onto the obvious, because getting mad was something she could handle. “Oh, good. Bring up Lillian. Unbelievable.”

“I kissed her,” Ric said, “because I was scared, too. I was scared of everything I was feeling for you—”

“That is such a load of crap—”

He was getting pissed now, too. “Did you hear anything I just said?”

“No,” she said. “Because I’m too
scared.
”

“Great,” Ric said. “Very mature.” He stood up. “My answer’s no. If you don’t want all of me, you’re not getting any.”

Annie laughed. “So…what does that mean? You’re going to withhold sex…?”

“Yup. I’m not going to be your toy. You either love me or you don’t, and if you love me, you’re going to have to trust me. It’s that simple.”

“Does the phrase
cutting off your nose to spite your face
mean anything to you?” she asked.

But Ric didn’t answer her. He just gently closed her door behind him.

C
HAPTER
T
WENTY

“W
e found a body to play the part of your dead ex-girlfriend,” Jules reported to Ric via cell phone. Jules shut his hotel-room door behind him, taking off his jacket and tie. Lordy, he was tired. The maid hadn’t been in yet to do up his room, but that was fine—he was going back to bed. “It’s in transit. ETA two o’clock. I don’t want to call Gordie Junior until we actually deliver it to you.” God forbid Junior offer to come by and clean things up right away. “We’re going to need a couple hours to implant the tracking devices—we’re using a high-tech system that won’t be discernible to any bug sweepers that are currently on the market. We’ve also got to get her dressed in the same clothes Lillian was wearing.”

“It’s going to take that long, huh?” On the other end of the phone, Ric didn’t sound very happy.

“Yeah, you know, getting this done involved just a
little
more work than a phone call to Bodies ‘R’ Us.” Jules couldn’t keep the testiness out of his own voice as he kicked off his shoes and stepped out of his pants.

“Sorry,” they both said at the same time.

“No,” Jules said, flopping back on his bed. “I apologize. I’m just…really tired. I’m going to use this time to get some sleep.”

“Before you go,” Ric said. “Have you been in touch with Robin? Because Annie’s going to go over to his hotel, do the black-eye thing. I thought we could tie it into last night’s brawl. You know, have Annie leave because she’s mad about my ex showing up?”

“I haven’t spoken to him this morning,” Jules said, closing his eyes. “No.”

“Um,” Ric said after a few moments of silence. “Will you call him? Or…I wasn’t sure if you wanted to give out his phone number…”

Crap. Jules really needed to give Ric a heads-up about the whole Robin situation.

“I’ll give it to you,” he said, staring now at the ceiling, “but before you talk to him, and definitely before you send Annie over there, you need to go online. YouTube dot-com. Do a search for Robin Chadwick. Our friend was pretty busy last night. You may not want Annie anywhere near the media circus that’s going to be following him around over the next few days.” He laughed. “On the other hand, maybe that’s the safest place in the world she could be, with an army of paparazzi protecting her. It’s your call, of course.”

He gave Robin’s cell phone number to Ric and shut his phone and his eyes.

Please God, don’t let his phone ring again. Please God, don’t let him think about Robin or Ben. Please God, just let him fall into a state of total unconsciousness. Please God, help him get this stupid song out of his head…

I can’t stop this feeling deep inside of me…

Jules turned over, pulling the covers up practically over his head. Think about the time he went to that spa in Provincetown and had a hot-stone massage. Think about the beautiful hills and scenery of Italy, where he’d actually taken a vacation last year. Think about how, back when he was a kid, his mother would sit beside him at bedtime to talk about his day. She’d pretend that his stuffed hippo was trying to sneak up on him, to jump on his head. The attack hippo, they’d called it. The hippo would always get him when he least expected it, and they’d laugh and laugh…

I…I’m hooked on a feeling, I’m high on believing that you’re in love with me…

Yeah, right.

He finally got up and took a shower, hoping the warm water would relax him—or at least wash away the scent of Robin that still clung to his skin. It was only then, with the water pounding down on him, that he finally let himself cry. For Ben, for Robin, for himself.

Even for Peggy Ryan.

Finally, both emotionally and physically exhausted, with his hair still damp, he crawled back into bed, and sleep finally approached, washing over him in waves of…

Tap, tap, tap.

Jules opened his eyes.

Tap, tap, tap, tap.

Had he put the “Do Not Disturb” sign on his door? He couldn’t remember.

Knock, knock, knock.

Crap. He rolled out of bed and staggered over to the door, not even bothering to pull on more than his boxer shorts. “Just give me some fresh towels and—”

“Hey,” Robin said. He was wearing sunglasses, no doubt to hide his bloodshot eyes, but he took them off now. “Mind if I come in?”

“Yes,” Jules said, and shut the door in his face. He crawled back into bed.

Knock, knock, knock.

Please God, please make him just go away.

Knock, knock, knock, knock, knock, knock, knock, knock, knock, knock, knock, knock, knock, knock, knock, knock, knock…

“Jesus!” Jules flung open the door. “If you really want to get your ass kicked, then by all means, come on in.”

He searched for his pants and savagely yanked them on, then crossed to the windows and opened the drapes. The room was flooded with brilliant sunlight, and Jules got a perverse sense of satisfaction as Robin winced and put his sunglasses back on.

Of course, the bright light meant that his own red eyes were right there for Robin to see, too. He also obviously noticed Jules’s unmade bed, as well as the fact that he was only half dressed.

“You were sleeping,” Robin deduced.

“Not yet,” Jules snapped. “Not since—” He cut himself off. Not since he’d fallen asleep in Robin’s limousine, in Robin’s arms—not exactly something he wanted to discuss. “I had a busy night—I spent most of it cleaning your bathroom.”

“That was you?” Robin asked.

“Who’d you think it was?” Jules retorted. “Elves?”

Robin shook his head. “I wasn’t sure if it was you or, um…”

“Ashley,” Jules said. “At least that was the way she signed her note to you. And yeah, I guess if you’re drunk enough, you can’t tell us apart. Although here’s a hint. I’m the one you claim to love.”

Okay, it was time to shut up and just let Robin say what he’d come here to say, so that he could leave as quickly as possible and Jules could get to sleep.

“I’m so sorry.” Robin looked and sounded as if he meant it.

It was actually pretty impressive that he was up and about. And the fact that he’d dared to come here at all was at least noteworthy.

And yes. That was definitely his dick talking, not his brain. Jules was so freaking attracted to this son of a bitch, he could watch that YouTube footage three times—not the PG-rated but still astonishingly sexy stripping-in-the-kitchen video, although he’d watched that more than once, too—and
still
try to find excuses for why Robin should be forgiven.

“There’s a lot I need to say,” Robin continued. “To apologize for. Including interrupting your nap. But I’m going to take Annie back to California—as soon as I can get us a flight—and I really wanted to see you before I left. May I sit down?”

Jules gestured to the pair of chairs over by the window.

Robin lowered himself gingerly into one of them.

“Were you hurt when you fell?” Jules asked, despite his resolve to keep his mouth shut.

Robin looked at him over the top of his sunglasses. “Did I fall?” he asked. “I don’t…remember very much of it. I remember coming back to my hotel after you got the news about Ben—that was when I really started drinking.”

“That was when you
started
drinking?” Jules repeated. As if the copious amounts of alcohol that Robin had consumed in the limo and at Burns’s party were insignificant.

“I guess I went a little overboard,” Robin said.

He
guessed.
“Haven’t you watched the clip on YouTube?” Jules asked.

Robin carefully shook his head. “No.”

“You should,” Jules said. “And yeah, you fell. Fortunately not off the twelfth-story balcony.” He was going to turn away, even close his eyes so that Robin wouldn’t see the hurt, the fear, the agony he’d felt while watching that nightmare unfold on digital video. Instead he looked straight at him. “You motherfucker.”

“I’m so sorry,” Robin said.

“You already said that,” Jules pointed out. “It wasn’t good enough the first time, either.”

“I know.” Robin looked down at the floor, contrite, ashamed. Or at least that was how he was playing it. The man was, after all, on the verge of receiving an Academy Award nomination.

His silence stretched on a little too long. “Tick tock,” Jules said, and Robin looked up, tears in his eyes.

Which was not a big surprise—not as big as what he said when he finally spoke. “I’m really sorry about Ben. I can’t imagine what you’re going through. I wanted to, um, see if you wanted to go up there,” Robin said. “To Arlington—the National Cemetery. That’s where he was buried, right? I mean, maybe you don’t want
me
with you, but…I just didn’t want you to…You shouldn’t have to go alone and…I’ll go with you, if you want.”

It was a generous offer—one that Jules was not sure he himself would have been able to make had their roles been reversed.

“That’s what I should have said to you last night,” Robin told him. “I should’ve grabbed you, and held you and…helped you. Instead…” He shook his head, roughly wiping his eyes with the heel of his hand so that Jules wouldn’t see him cry. “Who am I to judge you? Who am I to judge anyone?”

“It would have been nice,” Jules said carefully, in danger now of tearing up himself, “if you’d given me a chance to explain.”

But Robin shook his head. “You shouldn’t’ve had to explain anything. I let you walk out of my life years ago. I did everything but put a fucking bow on you and hand you to Ben—God, I wish I’d met him, Jules. He must’ve been…really special.”

“He was,” Jules said. “But Sam and Max got it wrong. Ben and I were just friends. I tried to love him, but…I didn’t. I couldn’t.”

Robin froze, silent. It was possible he’d even stopped breathing.

“I hoped it would happen,” Jules continued, “that one day I’d wake up and, I don’t know, maybe just…magically be in love with him. He was…He wasn’t perfect—he was in the closet, even to his parents, and that sucked. But he was funny and smart and sweet and faithful. He deserved better than me, because if I’d been man enough to let myself admit it, I would have realized that I was just using him—as a friend who I knew thought of
me
as more than a friend. Maybe someday I’d love him—I dangled that possibility out there in front of us both, but in truth I was just using him to mark time while I waited for the impossible.”

He looked at Robin, who was sitting in that chair on the other side of his hotel room as if every cell in his body hurt. His skin was pale, his hands were shaking, his chin was unshaved, his eyes were rimmed in red. It was crazy, but Jules still found him almost unbearably attractive.

“I was waiting for you,” Jules told him softly. “I’m still waiting. For something that’s…now even more impossible than it ever was.”

Robin sat forward. “No,” he said, coming even closer then, actually on his knees on the floor in front of Jules. “It’s not. Babe, listen, okay? Just please listen, because I’ve figured it out. I know you hate that I hide who I am, and I know how hard it’ll be for you to be in a relationship with me while I’m still not out, but if you give me three pictures—just three, that’s the deal my agent’s putting together right now—then I promise I will give you the entire rest of my life.”

“Except for the parts that you can’t remember.” That kind of grand, sweeping promise would’ve gone over a little better if Jules hadn’t been able to smell the whiskey on Robin’s breath. And it wasn’t last night’s whiskey, either.

“I’ve stopped drinking,” Robin told him, his blue eyes filled with steadfast resolve. Kneeling there like that, he was a picture of sincerity.

Jules laughed in his face. “As of when?” he asked. “Ten minutes ago? What’d you do, stop in the bar downstairs before you came up here?”

“Hair of the dog?” Robin tried to make it a joke—both the fact that he’d had a drink and lied to Jules about it.

Jules stood up. “Get out of my room.”

But Robin didn’t move. “I’m sorry,” he said. “And you’re right—it
was
only a few minutes ago that I made that decision. But I swear that I mean it. If I have to quit drinking to keep you, then—”

“Jesus Christ, Robin,” Jules practically shouted. “You have to quit drinking to keep from
dying.
”

But Robin didn’t believe him. Jules could see it in his eyes.

“What do you want?” Jules asked him. “You want to sleep with me again? Is that what this is? You want it so bad you’ll say and do anything? Yeah,
babe
, I’ll quit drinking…Just a three-picture deal…I’m yours…” His voice broke. Yeah, Robin was his—as long as Jules didn’t mind that he sometimes got blind drunk and had sex with total strangers.

“I am,” Robin whispered, reaching for him, and Jules knew that he was doomed.

“Yeah, well, I’m not yours,” he said, but he closed his eyes when Robin kissed him. And he knew he was as much of a liar as Robin, as he gave in to the soft pleasure that was Robin’s mouth, as he sank back with him into the warm sunlight that played across his bed.

Annie came downstairs with a suitcase packed and a hooded sweatshirt on.

“How does this look?” she asked Ric, pulling the hood over her hair and putting on sunglasses.

The hood, with its slight point at the top, made her look like a little kid, bundled up for a cold day. And the sunglasses…They were slightly cat-eye-shaped and reminiscent of a 1950s-era schoolmarm, which, combined with Annie’s sun-kissed cheeks and full, soft mouth, he found…

Hot. He turned away. “Ridiculous.”

She took off both the hood and the sunglasses. “Excuse me. You’re not allowed to be mad at
me
because
you
decide never to have sex with me ever again.”

“I never said never,” Ric corrected her.

“Yeah,” she shot back. “You did. You implied it.”

Before he could argue, the doorbell rang.

Annie went to the window. “There’s a truck out front. Is this…?”

“Yeah.” Ric opened the door. It was the FBI. The agent nicknamed Yashi was standing there in a pair of coveralls, holding a computerized clipboard.

“Good morning, sir,” he said in his trademark deadpan. “We’re here to install your new weatherproof flooring.”