Force of Nature

by Suzanne Brockmann

  The truth of the matter was, there were very few people on the planet that Ric wanted to picture having sex. Kate Winslet had long been one of them, but right now he could barely remember what she looked like. All he could think about was Annie sighing her pleasure, their fingers interlaced as he held her gaze and rocked her world.

  Annie, who’d thought he was bullshitting both her and himself when the truth had shot out of him like some verbal premature ejaculation.

  He wanted to spend his life with her.

  The idea terrified him, yet at the same time he knew that this was what he wanted. She was what he wanted.

  That conversation he’d had with his mother, all those years ago? He’d been telling her the truth. For him, it was Annie or no one. It had always been Annie.

  Sure, she made him want to take crazy risks. But so what? She made him feel alive.

  Ric glanced up at Jules, uncertain of what to say to alleviate both the man’s embarrassment and his obvious pain. But Jules wasn’t done.

  “Robin also came to my hotel this afternoon,” he quietly said. It was clear that he wasn’t telling Ric this because he wanted to, but rather because he felt it was information he needed to disclose. “Where once again, he stayed for…” He cleared his throat. “Quite some time.”

  “This afternoon,” Ric couldn’t stop himself from repeating. As in after Jules had seen that YouTube video?

  “Yeah, I’m an idiot,” Jules admitted.

  “Love’ll do that to a guy,” Ric said quietly.

  Jules looked up at him, obviously surprised.

  “I don’t get it,” Ric admitted. “The whole gay thing. But I also can’t understand why the entire rest of the world isn’t crazy in love with Annie. On the other hand, I’m really glad that they’re not because if they were, I wouldn’t stand a chance with her.”

  Jules was quiet for a moment, but then he asked, “When did you decide to be in love with Annie?”

  Ric laughed. “Decide? Man, I didn’t decide. I just was.”

  “Yeah, I know,” Jules said. “That’s how it was with me and Robin. How about being straight? How old were you when you decided to be straight? You know, attracted to women?”

  Ric stared at him. “You’re kidding.”

  “Your answer’s the same, right?” Jules told him. “You didn’t decide. You just were. It was the exactly the same with me, except I’ve always been attracted to men. It wasn’t a choice. It just was. I am who I am. And I like who I am—I wouldn’t choose to be anyone else.”

  “You really wouldn’t choose to be straight?” Ric couldn’t keep himself from asking. “I mean, if you could just snap your fingers and…?”

  “I really wouldn’t,” Jules said. “Like I said, I like me. Why would I want to mess with the way God made me?” He smiled, but it was rueful. “Although, if I could, I’d probably choose not to love Robin as much as I do.”

  That one was a no-brainer. If it were Annie on that YouTube video…Ric wasn’t sure what he’d do.

  Jules correctly guessed what Ric was thinking. “There are circumstances about last night you probably don’t understand,” he tried to explain. “The news of Ben’s death came at a really bad time and…Robin got drunk—more drunk—because he thought…” But then he shook his head. “It shouldn’t matter what he thought. The fact is, he got so drunk he nearly died. This is not the first time he’s done this, either. He’s an alcoholic—I know that. He says he’ll stop drinking, but I know that he won’t be able to, and it’s going to kill me. Because I’m going to have to walk away from him, and I don’t want to. God help me, I don’t, but I will. And then I’ll go into therapy and try to figure out why the hell I’m always attracted to men who end up hurting me.”

  They sat there in silence for quite some time, probably both praying that the phone would ring, because yes, that had been too much information. They both sat there hoping that Gordie Junior would call so that this nightmare could be on its way toward ending.

  “I really am sorry,” Jules finally said quietly. “For what it’s worth, I’ve never gotten my personal life mixed up in a case before. Well, that’s not completely true, since I met Robin while on an assignment, except that time I managed to stay away from him. Mostly.”

  “It’s not as if Robin’s the suspect,” Ric pointed out. “And so what if you were watched and Junior gets the word that you and Robin are…involved? That doesn’t change anything in terms of our business deal with him. In fact, it makes it more believable that we’d want to make a sex tape—something that’ll keep Robin safely in the closet.”

  Jules attempted a smile. “Well, I appreciate your positive thinking. I just can’t shake the feeling though, that somehow something I’ve done has messed everything up. I mean, why hasn’t Junior called?”

  “Because he’s got other evil to do,” Ric reassured him. “He’ll call.”

  Jules nodded, but it was clear he was still beating himself up.

  “You know, if you want to go take a nap,” Ric suggested, “I’ll man the phones.”

  “No.” Jules shook his head. But he did finally let his head rest against the back of the sofa. “Thanks, but no.”

  Ric got up to refill his mug with coffee. It was weird. If someone had told him yesterday that he’d be sharing secrets with some gay guy that he’d just met, he would have laughed his ass off. But he trusted Jules, he realized, and it somehow seemed fair to not let him be the only one baring his soul.

  So he said, “I did something really stupid last night, too. Well, it was this morning, actually.” He put the pot back in the warmer and took his mug back to the desk. “I asked Annie to marry me. That wasn’t the stupid thing,” he said as Jules opened his mouth to respond. “The stupid thing was, when she wigged, which she did, I gave her this ultimatum. Kind of an all-or-nothing thing, you know—and that was stupid. I know that she loves me, but I just…I let my pride get in the way, you know? For some reason, I got all wrapped up in what I thought she should do. She should trust me. If she doesn’t trust me then…what? I’m going to go back to my miserable, boring life without her? I mean, okay, that’s one option. Or I could say, yeah, I’d like for her to trust me, right now, today, but who says it has to be that way? I said it. It was my rule—and it’s a totally arbitrary one. I mean, come on. I know if I give her enough time, she’ll eventually know I’m for real.”

  Because if he gave her enough time, Annie would learn to trust him.

  And Ric also knew, compared to what Jules was going through with Robin, that loving Annie was laughably easy.

  Jules toasted him with his mug of what was probably now cold coffee. “Here’s to breaking stupid, arbitrary personal rules, which for me is summed up with one word—Robin.”

  Ric lifted his own mug. “To Robin,” he said.

  “And Annie,” added Jules.

  And the phone finally rang.

  Ric put the call on his speakerphone. “Alvarado,” he said.

  “Yo.” It was Gordie Junior. Thank you, baby Jesus. “I got a 911 call from your bud Julian Young. What’s going down?”

  Jules looked at Ric, who nodded, letting him take control.

  “I’m here, too.” Jules spoke up. “You’re on the speaker. Ric’s a little upset, so I’m going to do the talking, okay?” He didn’t let Junior respond. “There was an…accident, and he called me. He told me you were here last night, and that you made him an offer to, um, help with the cleanup if necessary and…It’s necessary.”

  “I made the offer”—Junior didn’t sound very friendly—“before I saw that bullshit video on YouTube. I thought we had an understanding—”

  “I had nothing to do with that video,” Jules interrupted him. “That was just Chadwick being Chadwick. He’s a fucking idiot.” It wasn’t hard to put conviction in his voice.

  “So, what, it was just a coincidence?” Junior didn’t buy it. “The very night we discuss a tape, one appears?”

  “Dude,” Jules said. “T
hat was not a sex tape. In fact, it was the Antichrist of a sex tape. You really think we purposely put out a video in which Chadwick needed Viagra to get it up? Jesus, now more than ever, we’re looking to do business with GBJ Productions. Enough so that we’re willing to drop our price a full fifth. Provided you help us out with our little…hygiene problem.”

  On the other end of the phone, Junior sniffed and hacked a loogie, no doubt while he scratched his balls. “Aight,” he said. “Hang tight. My boys’ll take care of you, but not until tomorrow. Figure sometime around midmorning. Maybe ten.”

  “Ten?” Ric said, his voice up an octave. “Junior, what the hell?”

  “I got other obligations,” Junior told them.

  “Does this mean you’ll have the money to make the tape soon?” Jules asked.

  “Are you always so fucking nosy?” Junior retorted.

  “Just in a hurry,” Jules countered, “after this YouTube thing. Chadwick’s movie opens wide next Friday. If we can get it done before then…”

  Junior was silent for several long moments. “I’ll have the money on Tuesday night. Is that soon enough?”

  Yes. “Then let’s plan to shoot on Wednesday morning,” Jules said. “I’ll call Chadwick.”

  “What I want to know,” Ric interjected, “is how you’re going to clean up my…mess in broad daylight.”

  On the other end of the phone, Junior laughed. “I do it all the time. If you want, you can come along and watch.” He hung up before Ric or Jules could respond, the dial tone buzzing through the speaker.

  As Ric disconnected the office phone line, Jules was already dialing Yashi. Someone was going to have to call Robin, too. “You mind calling Annie?” he asked Ric. “Filling her and Robin in?”

  Ric was more than happy to have an excuse to call.

  “Find out if they managed to get an earlier flight out,” Jules ordered as Yashi picked up.

  “Hey, boss,” Yashi greeted him. “We intercepted Junior’s call—we got it all on tape. And get this—Junior’s been spotted. He’s still at Burns Point. Apparently there’s some kind of party going on. Birthday for some grandson of Burns Senior’s main squeeze. Junior’s sitting out by the pool right now.”

  Good. “Keep me updated,” Jules said.

  “Now might be the right time to get some sleep,” Yashi suggested. “No offense, but you looked pretty wiped when I was over there.”

  “Keep me updated,” Jules said again, and shut his phone with a snap.

  Ric had taken his own cell phone into the conference room—no doubt to talk to Annie privately.

  And wasn’t Jules the idiot? He’d given away an excuse to call Robin. Although, what good would it do him? He didn’t have a potential happy ending lurking in his future, the way Ric did with Annie.

  He was willing to do it—to do like Ric and explode his arbitrary personal rules—especially the one that made him insist that he would not have a relationship with a man who was not out and open about who he was. He’d already come to the realization that, at least where Robin was concerned, he was willing to sacrifice that which he’d always considered his prime relationship directive—the ability to walk in the sunlight.

  But how about this one: I will not give up my career for you. Was he willing to toss out that rule, too?

  Or: My partner will be faithful to me at all times, under all circumstances.

  Except when blind drunk and completely out of control?

  How many YouTube videos would Jules need to watch, before he couldn’t take anymore? That number was somewhat less arbitrary.

  But the answer, obviously, was more than one.

  Robin put the pay-per-view movie—a real charmer with Rupert Everett and Kathy Bates—on pause when Annie’s cell phone rang.

  “Hey,” she said as she answered it, glancing at Robin, who clearly knew it was Ric on the other end.

  “Hey,” Ric said back. “I’m just calling to check in. We won’t get any action from Junior until morning. Apparently, he’s tied up until around ten.”

  “Junior’s busy until ten A.M.,” Annie reported to Robin. The frustration on his face surely mirrored her own. But then he checked his own phone, as if hoping he’d somehow missed Jules’s call. And she knew that, as far as frustration levels went, if this were a contest, Robin would win.

  “Our flight leaves at noon,” she told Ric. “We weren’t able to get anything earlier.”

  Robin stood up and headed into the hotel suite’s master bedroom, to give her privacy, as Ric said, “Make sure Robin knows that we’ve set a shoot date—this Wednesday morning—for the tape with GBJ Productions.”

  “You mean, the sex tape?” she said, and Robin turned back to look at her questioningly.

  “It’s been scheduled for Wednesday morning,” she told him, and she could see that he knew, instantly, what she was just realizing. Gordie Junior had given Jules and Ric a date by which GBJ Productions would have a major chunk of money—which they both hoped and feared was his payment for smuggling that nasty-ass terrorist into the country. It also meant that things were probably going to get hairy for the good guys, really fast. She could read Robin’s worry for Jules in his eyes.

  “Jesus, I need a drink,” he said.

  “No, you don’t,” Annie said. She spoke into the phone. “Will you please ask Jules to—”

  “No, don’t,” Robin said. “He needs to focus. I don’t want to make it harder for him.”

  Ric no doubt could hear Robin’s voice through her phone, because he said, “Genius should have thought of that last night.”

  “Just…tell Jules we’re thinking about him,” Annie said with an “Is that all right?” face at Robin.

  He sighed and shook his head—it was hard to tell if it was a yes-shake or a no—as he went into his bedroom. She heard him close his bathroom door behind him.

  “It wouldn’t hurt if Jules could call him,” she told Ric, sotto voce.

  “Jules asked me to convey this info,” Ric responded. “I’ve got to assume it was because he didn’t want to talk to Robin.”

  Okay. And here she’d been thinking that Ric had called because he wanted to talk to her.

  “Your mother called me,” she reported.

  “Ah, great,” he said. “I’m sorry.”

  “Yeah, that was so much fun,” Annie said. “She wanted us to have lunch next Friday. It was easier to just say yes.” She’d figured she’d just let Ric call his mom. Let him deal with the fallout after Annie was in California.

  “I’m sorry,” he said again. “I’ll call her and cancel.”

  “And explain?” she asked.

  “Yeah,” he said. “I’ll tell her…everything.”

  “Your dad seems to be doing well.”

  “He is,” Ric agreed. “Look, will you tell Robin that we’re going to be buying a plane ticket for him to get back to Sarasota on Tuesday night,” he informed her. “Under no circumstances should he use it, but…We’ve got to assume Junior has connections to someone in the travel industry. If he’s at all suspicious over these next few days…”

  “Why would he be suspicious?” Annie asked.

  “We’re just dotting all our I’s,” Ric said. “Jules is pretty thorough.”

  “Then maybe you better buy a second ticket for me,” she countered. “Aren’t I supposed to be Robin’s co-star in this video?”

  “Yeah, right. Over my dead body,” Ric said.

  “Since I’m not going to be having sex with you,” Annie pointed out, “I might as well have sex with someone.”

  He didn’t laugh, as she’d hoped. But he did say, “That was the other thing I wanted to talk to you about. The us-not-having-sex thing.”

  “Hah,” she said, her heart in her throat. “I knew you’d regret not going for that quickie.”

  This time he did laugh. “Yeah, well, you got that right. Although, really, it wouldn’t’ve made much of a difference. I’d still have wanted you again, a few minutes later.”
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  “So what are you saying?” Annie asked. “I’m like the Chinese food of sexual partners?”

  Another laugh. This one low, sexy. “That’s not how I’d put it, but there are definitely some similarities. I love eating Chinese food, too.”

  “Oh,” Annie said at his insinuation. She hadn’t meant to say anything, but the sound just kind of came out of her.

  “Yeah,” Ric said. “So now you know what I’ve been thinking about for most of the day.” He laughed, the sound a soft rumble in her ear. “That—and the fact that I’m an idiot. You want a year or two? You want an entire decade? Okay. You got it. I’m not going anywhere, and sooner or later, you’ll have to believe me when I tell you that I love you.”

  Oh, God.

  But Ric wasn’t done. “You want to pretend we’re friends with benefits until then, well, that’s fine, too—as long as I’m the only friend you’re…benefiting.”

  He paused then, as if he wanted her to say something, but her mouth was dry and she couldn’t speak.

  “Are we clear on that?” he asked, in his take-no-shit voice.

  “Yes,” she managed. But the argumentative side of her couldn’t keep from blurting, “But it has to go both ways.”

  Ric laughed again. “What part of Will you marry me? makes you believe that I have even the slightest interest in fooling around with anyone else—except of course you don’t believe me, so, yeah, okay. You have my word. You’ll be my only fuck buddy, too.”

  “Oh, that’s nice,” she said. “God, Ric—”

  “I’m just calling it what it is,” he countered, his temper obviously flaring. “If you don’t like the name for it, maybe you shouldn’t be—” He cut himself off and exhaled hard. “Look, for the record?” He lowered his voice. “When I’m inside of you, when I’m moving the way I know you love for me to move? I’m making love to you. That’s what I call it. So why don’t you pack that in your bag and think about it while you’re in California? Of course, if that concept’s too intense for you, maybe you should just focus on all the ways I’m going to make you come, next time we’re alone together.”