All Through the Night: A Troubleshooter Christmas

by Suzanne Brockmann

  Uh-oh.

  Robin came out of the bathroom in a thick, dark blue bathrobe. “I asked you to leave when you first came in”—he got in Adam’s face—“but now I’m telling you to leave, or I will throw you down the stairs.”

  “Of course, maybe you’re into it,” Adam told Robin, not backing down. “Watching Jules squirm when you show him the dailies and…Ah,” he said as he correctly read Robin’s surprise, “that’s how he’s handling it. He hasn’t been watching the dailies. He’s just been imagining what you’ve been up to, eating himself alive with jealousy.”

  Robin turned to look at Jules, with a giant question mark practically inscribed on his face.

  “Sam,” Jules said quietly.

  And Sam all but picked Adam up and carried him out of the room.

  It took everything he had not to make like Robin’s threat and toss the bastard into the foyer, express.

  “Why the hell do you do that?” Sam asked instead, but then he saw Adam’s eyes. And he knew the answer. And when he spoke again, he managed to make his voice less gruff, less angry. “They’re getting married tomorrow. It’s time to…wish them both happiness and to move on.”

  Adam didn’t want to quit, and Sam had to give him credit for that. Still, it was important he understood.

  “It’s time to let him go,” Sam said quietly. “He doesn’t want you anymore, Adam.”

  “He never wanted me,” he said, just as quietly. “It was always Jules. Always.”

  “You want to give Robin a wedding gift?” Sam asked. “Write Jules a note and tell him that. And then tell them both good-bye.”

  Robin closed and locked the door behind Sam and Adam.

  Jules had sat down on their bed, a picture of tension.

  “Why didn’t you say something?” Robin asked him.

  Jules just shook his head.

  “You know, I was starting to think you weren’t interested,” Robin said, and Jules looked up at him, horrified disbelief in his eyes. Still, he went on. “I was. I thought…maybe you didn’t think Shadowland was a project that was going to go anywhere, that, I don’t know, I was maybe wasting my time or…”

  “No,” Jules said. And now his eyes filled with tears. “God, Robin, I’m so sorry.”

  “Every time I talked about it, you kind of zoned out,” Robin said. “I thought you just didn’t want to tell me that I wasn’t good enough—”

  “I watched the promo you brought home,” Jules interrupted him. “It was amazing. You’re amazing. But…Adam was right. It was…really hard for me to watch. Seeing you…I know you’re acting, but—”

  “Do you?” Robin said. “Do you really understand?”

  His leather bag was next to the table on his side of the bed, and he rummaged through it, looking for the DVD he’d brought home just a few days ago. He found it, opened the DVD player and turned on the TV.

  “Oh, God,” Jules said. “Please let’s not do this now.”

  Robin slid the DVD drawer closed. “When do you want to do it, Jules?”

  “Never,” Jules admitted. “I want to do it never.”

  Jesus, watching this was going to bother him that much? Robin swallowed hard past the lump in his throat. “You know, if you don’t trust me, maybe we shouldn’t be getting married.” Jules was silent, and Robin felt a flare of panic. “Do you want me to quit?” he asked. “Because I will. I’ll only take roles that are—”

  “No, I don’t want you to quit.” Jules took a deep breath, looked at him, and said, “Play the DVD. Just…help me understand, okay?”

  And just like that, in a sudden realization, in a flash of insight that was blindingly clear, Robin realized that Adam had left out the most important part of his observation about Jules’s jealousy and possessiveness. Of course it was entirely possible that Adam, who was not a particularly deep thinker, had never figured it out.

  Yes, Jules was possessive, and yes, he got jealous quite easily.

  But he hated himself for it.

  This man, who was so okay with himself about everything else in his life, was not okay with this.

  “Do you know what I think when you get jealous?” Robin told him now. “I think, wow, he’s a little intense, but it’s okay, because there’s one thing that I’ll never doubt and that’s how much he really loves me.” He found the remote and sat down on the bed next to Jules. “You know what I really love?” Again, he didn’t wait for Jules to answer. “When we’re walking and you put your hand on my back, right here.” He moved Jules’s hand to the very spot, at the small of his back. “It’s such a possessive move—it’s subtle, but it’s so clear. Just like the body language you use when you’re with me. You probably don’t even know you do it, but you do everything but pee in a circle around me, staking out your territory.”

  “Oh, God,” Jules said, wincing. “I do?”

  “Don’t make that face,” Robin chastised him. “Listen to what I’m telling you. I love it, don’t you get it? I freaking love it.”

  Jules didn’t look convinced, so Robin tried saying it a different way. “Please stop beating yourself up for doing something that I find incredibly attractive.”

  Maybe it was time for some visual aids. He pushed the play button and the DVD started, with the opening credit sequence that Art’s team of editing magicians had already put to music. After a few establishing shots of Boston, the camera focused on Joe Laughlin and his friends, walking down the street.

  “That’s not me,” Robin said. “Okay? That’s Joe. I don’t walk like that.” He glanced at Jules, who was watching the screen. “But you do.”

  The scene changed to Joe in his bedroom—the shirt-ripping sequence, and Robin hit pause. “This may…look familiar,” he said. “But again, babe, it’s not me. Look at Joe’s face. He doesn’t really want any of these guys. He wants you—well, his version of you. He’s got a Jules of his own. There’s a character, Tommy, that Joe’s in love with—and has been for years. But he can’t have Tommy unless he comes out, and Joe’s never coming out. And now Tommy’s with someone else…and Joe’s totally miserable.”

  “When you got home that night,” Jules said, “after filming these scenes…”

  “Yeah,” Robin said. “I kinda brought Joe along. Sometimes I struggle to leave the character behind. I used to drink to, you know, flush my character from my system, but now I’ve found that it works to…Well, you could think of it as a reverse of Angel’s curse, you know, from Buffy? Instead of turning into a monster from that moment of true happiness, I lose my monster. Thank God. To be honest, playing Joe is kind of hard. It’s the life I didn’t choose, the path I didn’t take. It’s a wonderful role as an actor, but, babe, there’s not a day that goes by that I don’t thank my higher power that Joe’s life isn’t my path.”

  He unpaused the DVD, and they watched it run. “That’s not me,” Robin just kept saying. “It’s not me.”

  And finally Jules nodded. “Yeah, I see that.”

  “Are you just saying that so I’ll turn off the DVD?”

  He laughed. “No. It’s weird. It’s you, but it’s not. It’s…”

  “Oddly familiar?” Robin asked, and Jules nodded again. “That’s because I’m channeling you. Joe’s more you than me.”

  Jules obviously didn’t understand.

  “See, Joe’s really alpha,” Robin explained. “Like you. Everyone’s always comparing me to Joe, because the surface similarities are so obvious. Yeah, if I hadn’t come out and gone into rehab, there but for the grace of God, yada yada…But in truth, I’m playing Joe as if you had decided you wanted to be an actor. If you hadn’t had the parents that you had…Jules, Joe is a dark alter-ego of you. When I’m playing him and I’m in character, it’s like part of you is there, inside me. And when I’m not in character, I’m thinking about you, about how you would move or react. I spend my days thinking about you constantly, and…I should’ve seen what was going on. I should’ve figured it out, and I’m sorry I didn’t.”

&
nbsp; “I’m the idiot,” Jules said. “I should have been able to admit—”

  “You know what you do that really pisses me off?” Robin said. “You beat yourself up for not being perfect. Do you know how totally screwed I’d be if you were perfect? Because then I’d have to be perfect, too, and not only am I not perfect, but there’s no chance that I’m ever going to achieve perfection, so…”

  The DVD had reached its end, and Robin turned off the TV.

  “If you want, I’ll take you over to the studio,” he told Jules, “and I’ll show you exactly how we film the intimate scenes. The process is nothing like the final product. There are forty people on set, and the direction is…It can be pretty funny. It’s hard to stay in character and not just laugh. I think if you saw the way it’s done, that might help. You’d see how much the music and editing really creates the mood of the final cut.”

  Jules nodded. “I’d like that.”

  “And next time I come home in character,” Robin said, “pay attention to the way I look at you. Because that’s the way you look at me all the time. And yeah, it’s possessive. But that’s what makes it sexy as hell. Someone once told you that was a bad thing—your being so possessive—and maybe it was—for them. But babe, it really works for me, because I meant what I said that first night we made love. I’m yours.”

  Jules looked at him, and Robin could see that he finally got it. But still, he said it again, and he knew he would say it often, just to remind Jules. “I love that I’m yours.”

  Jules smiled. “Will you marry me?” he asked.

  Robin’s heart went into his throat as he smiled back into his partner’s beautiful eyes. “Funny you should ask. It’s at the very top of my to do list for tomorrow.”

  The call came in after Adam had given his statement to the police detective.

  He was bracing himself to go out into the cold with only his lightweight jacket on. He didn’t have a lot of room left on his credit card, so he was going to walk to the nearest T station and take the train out to Logan Airport.

  Cowboy Sam had already helped him book a flight—he had to get going, or he was going to be late.

  But he stopped when he heard the whoops from the kitchen, and with the noise came the news that Will Schroeder had come out of surgery with flying colors. He was going to be all right.

  Thank God.

  Adam stood in the foyer of this beautiful house that Robin shared with Jules. He couldn’t stop himself from gazing up the stairs. Neither of them had come down since he’d been up there with Sam, over an hour ago.

  “I’ll tell ’em you said good-bye,” Sam said now, still following him around.

  “Thanks. I wrote that note,” Adam said. “You can read it first if you want.”

  “I will.”

  And still he hesitated.

  “He’s really happy with Jules,” Sam reminded him.

  “Yeah,” Adam said. “I know.”

  “Sure you don’t want a ride to Logan?” Sam asked.

  “No,” Adam said. “You should be here in case Jules needs you. Best man.”

  “Stay away from them,” Sam said, not unkindly, “or I will fuck you up.”

  “Yikes,” Adam said. “You almost gave me a heart attack—until you added that last up.”

  Sam exhaled his disgusted exasperation. “Good-bye, Adam.” He opened the door and pushed him out onto the porch.

  The door closed tightly behind him, and Adam jammed his hands into his pockets and went down the stairs.

  There was a group of SEALs standing on the sidewalk out front, and as he went past them, one of them said, “Hey, you’re that actor, right? Shoot, I’m blanking on your name, but I loved you in American Hero.”

  “Thanks,” Adam said, but he didn’t stop walking, because Christ, all he needed to make the day perfect was to get hassled for being gay by some crew-cut-sporting no-necks.

  But the movie-literate SEAL disengaged himself from the others, trotting slightly to catch up, and then matched his stride to Adam’s. “You were amazing in Memphis Moon, too.”

  “Thanks.” Adam increased his pace, but the SEAL was taller than he was, and he easily kept up.

  So Adam stopped at the corner, beneath the streetlight. “Look, if you’re going to—”

  “I also loved Snow Day. I mean, yeah, it was light, but you were incredible.” He was really just a kid, early twenties, nice smile, good-looking in a born-and-raised-in-Kansas kind of way.

  Adam looked at him, and the kid held his gaze. And held his gaze. He had blue eyes. Very, very blue eyes. But, shit, he was young.

  “I’m Tony,” he said.

  “Yeah, well, I’m trouble,” Adam told him.

  Tony laughed at that. He actually had dimples. “I’m a SEAL,” he said to Adam with a shrug. “I like trouble.”

  Hey now, as Robin would’ve said.

  “It’s Adam, right?” Tony remembered his name. “Wyndham.”

  Adam nodded. “I’m kind of…nursing a broken heart,” he admitted.

  Tony nodded. But he took a pen out of his pocket, took Adam’s hand, and actually wrote his phone number on it, right on the palm. “Give me a call if it mends.” He pocketed his pen, flashing another of those killer smiles. “And in case you had any doubt just how much I like trouble, I’m pretty sure I just came out to my teammates.”

  He walked backward, moving toward those very teammates, facing Adam and smiling all the while.

  It was hard not to smile back, and as Adam finally headed for the T station, he even managed to laugh.

  What was it Cowboy Sam had said? Time to move on.

  Yeah. If he put his mind to it, he could maybe imagine doing just that.

  PART SEVEN

  joyful noise

  SATURDAY, DECEMBER 15

  BOSTON, MASSACHUSETTS

  ROBIN WAS FEELING A LITTLE LIGHTHEADED.

  He and Jules had gotten up early enough to eat breakfast, but he’d had only a few bites of his English muffin. All he’d wanted to do was to fast-forward to eleven o’clock, to that moment when they would stand at the altar of the church and say their vows.

  He probably should have had more to eat.

  “You okay?” Jules asked as they rode to the church in the limousine, his hand warm as he interlaced Robin’s fingers with his.

  “Yeah,” Robin said. “I’m just…marveling at the fact that it’s finally today, you know?”

  Jules smiled. “Yeah. This is it.”

  “Do you…” have any doubts? Robin was about to ask but, crap, Jules’s cell phone began to ring.

  Jules looked at him, waiting to answer it, but Robin shook his head. “You better…”

  They were way wicked early, but Jules had wanted to make sure he was on hand to talk to the head of the Secret Service. And sure enough there was a potential problem with the President and Mrs. Bryant’s seating.

  “We’ve just pulled up at the church,” Jules said into his phone. “I’ll be inside in thirty seconds.”

  “You are going to turn that off during the ceremony,” Robin said. “Please say yes.”

  “Oh, yeah.” Jules laughed. “It’ll not just be off, but it will be off my person. I don’t want Mario tackling me on my way down the aisle.”

  Art Urban’s costume designer had gifted them with hand-tailored tuxedos. Robin had never worn a tux that fit as well or looked as sinfully good. But, “No wallets, no cell phones,” Mario had sternly ordered them before going off on a rant about how American men loaded their pockets and then were surprised when their suits didn’t have clean lines.

  “You can put it in my bag.” Robin had already put his own phone in his bag, since he needed to bring it anyway, to carry the…“Crap.”

  “What?” Jules asked.

  “Nothing. It’s okay.” He couldn’t believe it. He’d left part of his present for Jules at home. But then he could believe it, because he always forgot things when he skipped breakfast.

  “I’ve got to run i
n,” Jules told him, giving him a swift kiss.

  Robin caught him by the arm, and kissed him more thoroughly because once they got inside, Sam and Alyssa were going to grab Jules, and Janey and Cos were going to grab Robin. They’d drag them into separate rooms to wait, out of sight, for the guests to arrive.

  Robin wasn’t going to see Jules again until they met at the back of the church, to walk Jules’s mom down the aisle.

  But then he had to smile, because it was really just a matter of minutes now. Less than an hour until the majestic organ music began to play.

  He’d once gone two years without seeing Jules, because of his own foolishness and fear. In hindsight, it didn’t seem possible that he’d survived two, long, dreary, Jules-less years…Especially when, these days, too many hours apart from Jules made him antsy.

  Robin kissed him again, and Jules smiled back at him, his heart in his eyes.

  “Go,” Robin told his partner. “I’ll be right behind you.”

  He watched Jules dash up the steps into the church, and then he pressed the intercom button that allowed him to speak to the driver.

  “Hey, Pete, do you need to pick up anyone else?” Robin asked.

  He could hear the sound of paper—pages being turned—as the driver checked his schedule. “No, sir,” he reported. “I’m supposed to be on hand for emergencies, but other than that, I’m to sit and wait until you and Mr. Cassidy come out of the church, after the ceremony.”

  Robin looked at his watch. It was two minutes after ten. “I left something at home,” he said. “How long do you think a round trip, there and back, would take?”

  “This time a day? Twelve minutes,” Pete said. “Fifteen, tops.”

  “Let’s do it,” Robin decided. He’d be back before anyone even knew he was gone.

  Maggie didn’t want to go to the wedding.