Hot Target, page 49
“Oh, shit,” Cosmo said. “Excuse me.” He met Jane’s questioning gaze. “I think I’m about to be arrested for stealing a car.”
“What?” Jane started to laugh. “Are you serious?”
But Tom Paoletti and Decker were suddenly both there. They intercepted the police officers, pulling them out of the lobby, far from Cosmo and Jane.
“Officers, I’m sorry, I can’t go with you,” Cos said as he gazed into Jane’s eyes. “I’ve got other plans for tonight.”
CHAPTER
TWENTY-NINE
Robin had had a slew of visitors to his hospital room over the past few days.
Adam came twice, which was awkward and weird.
Janey and Cosmo came every morning and every night.
Harve and Guillermo and Gary all smuggled in bottles of whiskey, bless their hearts.
His dad even flew in with what’s-her-name, his latest wife, although they didn’t stay long.
There had been no sign, however, of Jules.
Robin would’ve at least liked to thank the guy for saving his life.
And then, on day three, the least likely visitor in the entire known universe walked into his room.
Patty Lashane.
Robin had just been silently bemoaning the fact that there was nothing good on TV at two o’clock in the afternoon. ESPN had women’s college lacrosse, which was even less interesting than Rugrats, and why wasn’t there a channel that showed all SpongeBob, all the time?
“How are you, Robin?” Patty asked.
And suddenly scary women carrying big sticks and wearing little plaid skirts seemed fascinating. He somehow managed to smile at her as he reluctantly turned off the TV. “Pretty good,” he said, “considering I was shot. Twice.”
“I know,” she said.
“You, uh, had a pretty harrowing experience there yourself,” Robin said.
“I don’t remember any of it,” Patty told him.
She was wearing a suit. Wide-legged pants with a matching jacket. Nice shoes. She’d gotten her hair cut, too. “You look good,” he said as she sat down in the chair across the room.
“Thank you,” she said. “I have a lunch date.”
“With Wayne?” he asked.
She blinked at him. “No. With Victor Strauss.”
“The director?”
She bristled. “Is that so hard to believe?”
“No, of course not. You’re like, what? Twenty? And he’s ninety. This is Hollywood. Go for it.”
“He’s not that old,” Patty said.
“What about Wayne?” Robin asked.
“Wayne Ickes?” She laughed as if he’d made a big joke. “He and I are just friends.”
“He helped save my life,” Robin told her. “You should have seen him—total hero material. Everyone’s ducking for cover and he’s right there. . . . Adam, too.” Which really was the surprise of the century. But he didn’t want to talk about Adam. Not with Patty, who knew that he and Adam had . . . God. “Wayne’s brave, he’s nice, and he’s obviously hung up on you.”
She fiddled with her handbag, and he knew the nonchalance was an act. “He’s dating Debbie, the new craft services girl,” she admitted, and when she looked up at him, there was misery in her eyes.
“Ouch,” Robin said.
“He thinks I’m with Victor—you know, with Victor—because he saw the flowers that Victor sent me when I was in the hospital and . . .” She shook her head. “I’m pretty sure Victor only wants what you wanted.”
No shit, Sherlock.
“Except Victor’s not faking it,” Patty said. “He’s definitely not gay.”
“I’m not gay,” Robin protested. “I just . . . happened to have sex once with . . . you know, another man.”
“Is that why you slept with me?” she asked. “So people would think you were straight?”
“I’m not gay,” he said again, unable to keep desperation from his voice. “I was really trashed when I . . . I got a little too into character, and . . . I’m not even sure what happened that night with Adam. I don’t remember too much about it.”
“I got tested for AIDS,” she told him. “I’m negative.”
AIDS. Jesus. “That’s good,” he managed to say. “Look, Patty, I know you’re still mad at me, but—”
“I won’t tell,” she said. “But you owe me. You take my phone calls. You remember my name. I’m going to be a producer myself one of these days, so you’ll read the scripts I send you and—”
“Are you blackmailing me?”
She smiled at him sweetly. “Absolutely.” She stood up. “I have to go. I really came by because I wanted to let you know that I’m not pregnant. You know, so you could stop worrying about it?”
Pregnant? “Whew,” he said.
“You jerk. You didn’t even remember, did you?”
“I’ve been thinking about other things,” Robin admitted. He tried to change the subject. “I wish you’d call Wayne and tell him the truth about you and Victor.”
“It’s too late,” she said.
“It’s never too late,” he told her. “You want me to call him? I’m going to call him, okay?”
Patty shook her head. “Do you remember anything about that night with me?” she asked.
Robin didn’t answer right away. It was funny, actually. He could barely remember the nights he’d spent with Patty and Adam. And yet he remembered every kiss he’d shared with Jules. In great detail.
“Yeah,” he lied now, because he’d already done enough damage. “I remember that it was really great.”
“It was over in about ten seconds,” she informed him. “I didn’t even get to . . . you know. And then you barfed all over my bathroom. On a scale from one to ten, you’re, like, less than zero.”
“Well, wow, thanks so much for dropping by,” he said. “You really cheered me up.”
She lingered by the door. “I’m glad you didn’t die.”
“I’m glad you didn’t, too,” Robin told her. “And thanks for . . . you know.” Not rushing right out to give an interview with the National Voice.
“Your calling Wayne doesn’t make us even. You’re still less than a zero,” she said, as she went out the door.
“So that went well.” Jules came into Robin’s room, surprising the hell out of him. He must have been waiting right outside in the hall. He had on his FBI agent clothes—dark suit, white shirt, red tie.
“Ah,” Robin said, managing a smile. How much of that had Jules overheard? “It’s unexpected-visitor day. Lucky me.”
“It’s warm in here.” Jules took off his jacket before he sat down in the chair Patty had recently vacated.
“I was cold. The extra blanket was too heavy on my leg, so . . .”
Jules started rolling up his sleeves. “I came to say good-bye.”
Robin gave up trying to smile. “Are you going back . . . ?”
“To D.C.,” Jules told him. “My work here is done.”
There wasn’t much Robin could say in response to that. At least not with that lump in his throat.
“Did your sister tell you that we found John Bordette’s computer?” Jules asked.
“Yeah.” Robin took a sip from his water cup. “Dude was looney tunes. His keeping a ghoulish journal like that was . . . Yeesh. She said he wrote this really creepy poetry, too.”
“Some of it was pretty good,” Jules said. “Very dark, though.”
And there they sat, just looking at each other.
“Have the doctors talked to you about a therapy program?” Jules finally asked, and Robin nodded. “You’ve got to start slow. Don’t expect to get out of the hospital and then go for a five-mile run the next day.”
Robin nodded. “Adam told me you were shot a few years ago.”
He wasn’t sure what made Jules look so startled for a moment—the fact that he’d brought up Adam, or the fact that he and Adam had obviously discussed him.
But Jules quickly composed himself, even laughed softly. “Gee, I was under the impression that you guys didn’t spend all that much time talking.”
“We talked a lot,” Robin told him. “Mostly about you.”
“Oh, well, that makes everything all right, then.” He blew out a quick burst of air. “Sorry.” He stood up. “I think it’s probably time to go.”
Robin moved wrong, or too fast, or maybe God was just giving him a giant noogie, but he yelped and cursed from the sudden flare of pain.
Jules was instantly at his side. “Are you okay? You need me to get the nurse?”
Robin shook his head. Don’t go. He didn’t say it. He couldn’t say it. He pretended the tears in his eyes were the involuntary kind, the kind that came with intense pain. It was just a side effect, along with the sweat he could feel on his forehead and upper lip. He took a drink from his cup, which helped.
“How are you managing the pain?” Jules asked.
“The head nurse likes me,” Robin said. “I’m doing fine.”
Jules leaned closer. “You smell like whiskey.”
“Yeah,” Robin said. At this proximity, he could smell Jules’ cologne. He always smelled so good. And his eyes were so brown. “And then there are my very considerate friends.”
“So much for my hope of you coming out of the hospital sober.” Jules was really upset. “God damn it, Robin—”
“Hey, come on . . .” Robin moved wrong and ended up zinging himself again. “Fuck, fuck, fuck . . .”
When he opened his eyes, Jules was taking the lid off his water cup. He sniffed it, then took it into the bathroom and poured the contents down the sink.
“I realize how futile this is,” he said as he brought the cup back into the room. “You’ll just refill when I’m gone.”
“So don’t go,” Robin said, making it a joke.
Jules took it seriously. “And wait around for the next time you get so drunk that you want to experiment again? No, thank you. I’m going home.” He poured a new cup of water from the pitcher on the counter, and reaffixed the top. “Did you know that Jack and his partner, Scotty, have been together for almost fifty years?”
Whoa. “You mean, like, exclusively?”
“I mean, like, committed to each other. Completely. Which includes fidelity. That’s not a purely hetero concept, you know—and they lived faithfully and very happily ever after.”
“Man,” Robin said. “Sex with just one person, for the rest of your life? It sounds a little too limiting.”
“Said the straight man to the gay man.” Jules came back to his bedside. “Your roots are showing.”
“What is this? Bash the invalid day?”
“Your hair’s much darker than I thought.” Jules reached out and touched Robin’s hair, parting it so he could get a better look. “So you’re really, what? Black Irish? Black hair, blue eyes?”
Robin nodded. Dear God, that felt too good. “Robin O’Reilly Chadwick,” he said in his best Irish brogue, praying that Jules would stop. Or that he would never stop. He wasn’t quite sure which. “Top o’ the mornin’ ta ya, Jules Cassidy.”
Jules smiled. “It’s afternoon.”
“Not to a hard-drinkin’ Irishman, it’s not.”
That did the trick. Jules stepped back. “I gotta go. My plane leaves in just a few hours.”
Robin tried to memorize him, standing there with his tie slightly loosened, his sleeves rolled up. As he took his jacket from the back of the chair, Robin didn’t really check out his backside. He was just admiring the fact that the man was in such good shape.
Liar.
Jules slung his jacket over his shoulder, turned for one last look. . . .
“Keep in touch,” Robin said.
“I don’t think that’s such a good idea.”
“So this is good-bye good-bye? Have a nice life?”
“Yeah,” Jules said. “I think that’s best.”
“I thought we were friends.”
“We’re not,” Jules said. “I can’t be your friend because you’re not in a place right now where you can really be my friend, so . . .”
“Why, because I don’t want to suck your—”
“No.” Jules cut him off. “Because you do.”
“Okay,” Robin singsonged, to hide how rattled he was. “If believing that floats your boat . . .” He could do only a half shrug without making his eyes roll back in his head from the pain.
“I’m sorry,” Jules said. “I deserve better than that. I deserve someone who really wants me.” His voice shook. “God damn it—I deserve sunlight.”
“I’m sorry, too,” Robin whispered.
“Take care of yourself,” Jules said, and swiftly went out the door.
“Wait!” Wasn’t Jules even going to kiss him? One last lingering breathless taste of what Robin claimed he didn’t want? One last sweet touch of lips, a gentle rasp of tongues to remind him of what he was too scared to let himself have?
Pretty boy. Homo. Little faggot.
Jules stuck his head back in the door, so obviously hoping to hear the words that Robin couldn’t say, wouldn’t say.
“Steer clear of that mean Peggy Ryan,” Robin told him instead.
Jules nodded. “Yeah,” he said. “Thanks.”
And then he was really gone.
Robin shifted his weight, got slammed with the pain, and let tears rush to his eyes.
“What are you doing?” Jane asked as she came out the conference room doors and into the backyard.
Cosmo was standing at the edge of the property, staring at the back of the house. Still looking for that freaking bullet. He didn’t bother to tell her. She knew.
“Your mom called,” she told him. “She’s running a little late, so if we can delay picking her up by about forty minutes . . .”
“Sorry about that,” he said.
“No,” she said, “I think she’s really considerate. Calling ahead so we don’t have to sit in her living room, waiting for her? Listening to the soundtrack from Jekyll and Hyde. Again.”
He laughed. “All you have to do is ask her to play something else.” His mother quite possibly loved Jane more than she loved him.
“I didn’t want to tell you this,” Jane said. “But I secretly love that musical. Your mom’s going to let me borrow it, along with Les Mis and Phantom—my other big faves—so I can put them onto my iPod and create a continuous loop—just keep it playing all the time.”
Cosmo cracked up. Thank God she wasn’t serious.
But then she hummed a few bars from the duet from the second act. God, he hoped she wasn’t serious.
“So what’s the hardest part about being a SEAL?” she asked him.
“Having to spend time away from you,” he told her. Not only was it true, but his answer got him a seriously intense kiss. What was it both Jane and Robin always said?
Score.
“I was kidding,” Jane told him, her arms up around his neck, her fingers in his hair, her body soft against him. “About the iPod.”
“You’re hair looks great,” he told her. She was wearing it up, intricately piled on top of her head. “But is it really going to last?”
“This is just a trial run. Wait’ll you see me tomorrow in my dress.” She wiggled her eyebrows. “Wait’ll you see me out of my dress. The crew bought me special-occasion underwear.”
Words failed him so he kissed her again.
Forty minutes. For. Tee. Minutes. Before he could suggest, oh, say, a preview of that underwear, Jane spoke.
“This’ll be a really good house for kids, don’t you think?” she asked.
Kids? Shit. Cosmo didn’t answer that one for a long time.
They were driving to Las Vegas—with his mother, no less—to get married, because his leave was almost up, and Jane didn’t want to wait.
He was surely going OUTCONUS with SEAL Team Sixteen. Probably to Afghanistan. Maybe Iraq. For God knew how long.
He suspected they were one of a very small number of people who brought along the mother of the groom when they eloped. But Jane had insisted on that, too.
Demanding woman. Now she wanted kids, too.
“Are you ever going to speak again?” Jane asked him. “Or have I just silenced you for good?”
“Yes,” Cosmo managed to tell her. “A very good house for kids.”
“That’s what I thought, too. I mean, you know, in a few years, after we get it fixed up.” She was silent for, oh, maybe a tenth of a second before she asked, “What’s the second hardest part? Of being a SEAL? Not counting BUD/S training.”
Over the past few weeks they’d talked, pretty much endlessly, about all the types of training he’d gone through, that he continued to go through, as part of the U.S. Navy’s Special Operations. He knew Jane needed to hear as much about it as he could tell her. Knowing he had the ability to take care of himself while he was off on a dangerous mission would help her sleep at night.
So he’d damn near talked himself hoarse. He’d loved jump school. He’d loved the diving and underwater demolition, too, and he’d told her all about it. He loved the nonstop learning about what the Teams referred to as their toys—the high-tech equipment that they used while out in the “real world.” Survival training was always interesting to say the least, and PT was PT. Some of the guys suffered through; others merely endured it. Cosmo’s relationship with the endless physical training was slightly more friendly. He appreciated it. It kept him in top shape.
He’d talked at length about that, too.
Now he didn’t hesitate. “Report writing.”
Jane laughed, which was his intention. There were sides to his job that he disliked far more than writing a report, but today was a special day, and he wanted to keep things light.
“That’s right,” she said. “You mentioned something about that. You know, other people—normal people—are afraid of heights or close spaces or snakes. . . .”
“It’s not a fear,” he said. “It’s more of a dread. It’s just . . . not something I particularly enjoy doing.”
She got serious. “Aren’t you going to have to do a lot of it if you go to work for Tom Paoletti?”
“When,” he reminded her. He wasn’t ready to leave SEAL Team Sixteen, not for a few years at least. But when he did retire—and being a SEAL was a very young man’s game, so that wasn’t too far in the future, old man that he was at thirty-two—he had an open invitation to join Tommy’s Troubleshooters. Just a few days ago, they’d talked a bit about Cosmo opening a Los Angeles office. “It’s no different from what I have to do as a chief in the Navy.”
