ripping wet and shaking with exhaustion, anger, and fear—his head still throbbing from where he’d damn near cracked it open—Robin crouched on the foredeck of Foley’s fishing boat, regaining his equilibrium.

Climbing up the slick side of the boat was much harder to do in real life than it was when filming Riptide. For one thing, the boat he’d infiltrated on the movie set had been moored. They’d used special effects to make it look as if he were boarding a speeding vessel. This one, however, had been moving forward at a steady clip.

Plus he’d been freaking dizzy from smacking his head when Foley had pitched him overboard. And yeah, he’d also had quite a bit to drink, which hadn’t helped.

His first thought had been to swim to the distant shore, but the idea of leaving Annie alone with Foley was too awful.

So Robin had clung, at first, to the anchor, way up at the bow of the boat, afraid if he slipped or was shaken free he’d be swept away. Or worse—swept underneath and into the churning propellers.

The side was too slippery to climb without the aid of the props department and their ropes and netting, handily placed for him to grab. He’d finally managed it by creating a rope of sorts with his jeans and his shirt. He’d used the sodden clothing, tossing it up onto the boat until he knocked one of the hawsers free.

But the rope had dangled there—just out of his reach. Again, he’d tried using his clothes to pull it closer, but it soon became clear that he’d just have to let go of the anchor and leap toward the damn thing, catching it as the boat moved past.

Robin was athletic—as long as he wasn’t detoxing or shit-faced. This was the kind of stunt he would have enjoyed doing on a movie set.

Problem was, real life allowed for only one take.

He went for it, though, when he heard Annie scream. Jesus, what was Foley doing to her? She’d started shouting then, so he knew he hadn’t killed her, thank God. Robin could still hear her now, crying, from down in the stateroom.

He wrung out his boxers as best he could and moved as silently as possible toward the stern of the boat, and those stairs leading below.

“You are so fucked,” Foley told Annie as he got off the phone. “It could have been quick. But no. Junior wants you alive. He’s going to take a knife to you on the deck of that yacht, with your boyfriend watching. Congratulations, you stupid, stupid bitch.”

He went out the stateroom door, closing and locking it behind him.

It was the dead last thing Annie’d expected him to do. She was so completely stunned, she just lay there for several long seconds, her wrist clutched to her chest.

But it wasn’t some kind of cruel joke Foley was playing on her. He didn’t jump back into the room shouting “Kidding!” before he shot her in the head.

Annie heard him stomp his way back up to the galley, and she roused herself, dragging her damaged body over to the end of the fuse to Robin’s bomb. The lighter was in her front-left jeans pocket—she had to use her unbroken right hand to get it out, which wasn’t either easy or quick.

It gave her ample time to consider exactly what she was about to do.

She, who never quite forgave Pam for taking her own life, was about to do the very same.

She had to admit that she liked the irony of Foley dying as a result of Robin’s bomb. He may have killed Robin, but with Annie’s help, Robin was going to even the score.

And over in the not-quite-as-bloodthirsty column of reasons to light the fuse was the fact that together, she and Robin would eliminate Junior’s option of blowing up the yacht and killing Ric and Jules. This way, they’d have a chance. Maybe the massive explosion would help them in some way. Maybe it would draw the Coast Guard.

Yes, if Robin were here, he’d definitely be urging her on.

She finally got the lighter free.

And lit the fuse.

Jules silently moved into position, watching as Ric stumbled and limped up the companionway and onto the deck.

This man, whom he’d come to respect and even love as a friend, was marching unswervingly to his all-but-certain death.

Annie was never going to forgive Jules for letting Ric do this. And yet Ric had been right. There was no other way.

“Don’t shoot,” Ric called to Junior.

From where Jules lay atop the galley counter, slightly back from that window, he had a clear view of Ric.

He held his hands up, his gun loosely in his right, in a position of surrender. He limped with each step he took—farther out onto the deck, but not too far from this window where Jules was waiting. “I’m here. Jules is no longer a threat and I…I surrender. Don’t let Foley hurt her…” He dropped to his knees, which had to have hurt his wounded leg. “Please…Don’t let him hurt her…I’ll do whatever you want.”

The day was beautiful. The ocean air was clear and fresh, and the sky was a remarkable shade of blue.

It wasn’t quite as beautiful a blue, though, as Robin’s eyes.

Jules steadied the hand that held his weapon, forcing all thoughts of the past and future out of his mind. There was only now. There was only his heart beating, his eye on Ric, his steady finger on the trigger as he waited.

And waited.

Junior would eventually send his men out to disarm Ric. Although one of them would probably shoot him first.

“She loves me,” Ric sobbed, the picture of a broken, desperate man. “She said she loves me—I gotta talk to her, please, just one last time…”

Robin found a flare gun and a bottle of gin in the storage bin beneath the bench seats on the deck of the fishing boat.

The flares were wrapped in plastic—he almost couldn’t unwrap them, but he did, and he got one loaded into the gun with hands that were once again shaking.

Which was why he took a healthy slug of the gin.

But nope, his hands didn’t stop shaking. He wasn’t starting to detox again—he was just scared shitless by what he was about to do.

He put the bottle down and was in the process of taking a series of deep, calming breaths—an exercise an acting teacher had taught him years ago—when Foley came out of the stateroom and started crashing around in the galley.

Robin quickly pulled himself back along the side of the above-deck cabin.

After what seemed like hours, the microwave finally beeped. Then came the unmistakable smell of coffee, and the sound of a spoon against the side of a ceramic mug.

And then Foley stomped up the stairs and onto the deck. He took out his phone and dialed, coffee mug in his other hand. “Yeah,” he said. “I got a visual—I see you—I should be alongside you in five, maybe ten minutes.”

It was now or never. And while he would have preferred never, as Foley shut his phone, Robin stepped out onto the deck, flare gun held in his best double-handed Navy SEAL grip.

“Hands where I can see them!” Robin said.

Foley laughed at him. “You’re fucking kidding me,” he said. Dropping the mug, he reached for his gun.

So Robin leaped forward and shot the flare, point-blank, into Foley’s ugly face.

The flare sent Foley staggering back, and his gun clattered on the deck as he screamed, his hair on fire.

Jesus. But Robin didn’t stand and stare. He scrambled after the real gun as Foley fell to his knees, batting at his head. But then, still smoldering, he was up again, and he roared as he came after Robin, like some horrific version of the Energizer Bunny.

The tears always worked.

People always underestimated a grown man who broke down and cried, the way Ric was crying now—on his knees on the main deck of the yacht.

And as for Junior, well, here he came. More than ready to put his boot-print on the back of a man who was shattered. “Put the gun down and push it away from you,” Junior commanded, his voice coming from slightly above and behind Ric—from the deck atop the galley.

That was good. Junior was close enough to get a full visual.

There were a variety of potential ways to play this. Ric’s original plan was to go out onto the deck without a gun, hands empty and outstretched. When Junior approached, Ric’s intention was to open his jacket and reveal the explosives and the fuse that he’d already lit.

He could feel the heat from the time fuse as it burned, slowly making its way around and around his waist.

When Junior saw what he was wearing, he’d panic, calling for his men to help him throw Ric overboard. Well, Ric’s body. Because before he hit full panic, he’d surely shoot Ric in the head.

But the handgun that Jules had taken from the man he’d killed on the lower level brought a few other options to the table.

One or two of which had an outcome that included the possibility of Ric’s living through these next few minutes.

“I lit the fuse,” he said, loudly enough for Junior to hear him as he unzipped the jacket. And then the time for talking was over. Ric pointed the gun at himself.

And he pulled the trigger.

Annie sat on the floor of the stateroom as the fuse burned, drinking from a bottle of vodka and trying to imagine the life she would have shared with Ric had things worked out differently.

Trouble was, she couldn’t get past the sex.

When she tried to picture them having dinner together, even though she started the fantasy with herself perched on one of his kitchen stools, just watching him cook, it soon led to hijinks atop the dining-room table.

She could imagine them taking a flight out to California, to talk to Sam Starrett about working for Troubleshooters Incorporated—and being unable to survive the trip without slipping into the tiny airplane bathroom together.

It didn’t matter where they were or what they were doing, all Ric would’ve had to do was look at her, and she would’ve looked back at him and…

She wished she could have left a note. She wished she could be sure that Ric had heard her say she loved him.

She wished—

Boom! Something that sounded a lot like a gunshot made her smack her head on the wall behind her.

Oh, God. Had she lit the fuse too late? Had they already reached Junior’s yacht?

She could hear Foley talking—he was on the phone again as he unlocked the stateroom door.

She braced herself, gripping the neck of the bottle with her right hand, ready to use it as a weapon. She was not leaving here without a fight. She had no idea how many minutes it had been since she’d lit the fuse—maybe all she had to do was stall a little bit longer.

Foley was having trouble with the lock, which was good, but he finally got it, and with a crash, he pushed it open wide.

Except it wasn’t Foley, it was…Robin?

“Oh my God, you’re alive,” Annie said.

He had a red welt on his forehead, but he was definitely breathing. He’d stripped down to his boxers, and he was holding both Foley’s handgun and his phone.

“I’m on a boat in the middle of the Gulf, off Sarasota,” he said into that phone. “Coordinates? I have no clue. We’re out of sight of land, there’s a lot of water—it’s blue. There’s another boat out here—a big one, a yacht, where FBI agent Jules Cassidy is being held by Gordon Burns Junior. He needs backup and he needs it now. ”

“Oh my God,” Annie realized. “Robin! Shit! I lit the fuse!”

As Jules watched from his position in the galley, Ric shot himself.

The force pushed him onto his back, where he lay motionless and silent in the aftermath of the deafening gunshot, his jacket flapped open.

Junior was as surprised as Jules.

“Holy fuck,” he heard Junior say as he, too, saw the blood seeping onto the deck. And then he saw the explosives Ric was wearing.

“Holy fuck,” Junior said again. “He said he lit the fuse! Jesus Christ, help me throw him overboard!”

And here they came, thundering down from the deck that was directly over Jules’s head. Donny, Purple Shirt, and Suit Number Two. Even Junior came down, although he hung back as his men rushed toward Ric—as they rushed toward the window to the galley, where Jules was waiting.

Where he finally stopped waiting, and opened fire.

Ric rolled as Jules proved himself to be as good a shot in the field as he was at the firing range.

The FBI agent took out Junior’s men, shooting to kill.

Meanwhile, Ric headed for Junior. But Jules fired again, shooting Junior’s weapon out of his hand, making the son of a bitch scream with pain, clutching bloody fingers to his chest.

Ric heard Jules kicking out the now-broken galley window, trying to get to Junior—to keep him from leaping over the side of the yacht.

But Ric reached him first. He grabbed the bastard’s legs, knocking him down to the deck and making him scream, again, like a little girl.

But it wasn’t because his hand was hurting him. No, it was the explosives Ric was still wearing that made him frantic to get away. Apparently he thought Ric was still going to explode in a fiery ball—taking Junior with him.

The length of cord—time fuse—was still burning, although it had to be almost done. Sure enough, a little flash of fire jumped out of the unconnected end.

“Bang,” Ric told Junior. He looked up at Jules, who pulled Junior away from him, grabbing the bastard’s cell phone out of his pocket before shoving him down onto the deck.

“Hands on your head,” Jules ordered. He glanced at Ric. “You shot yourself.”

“Yes, I did,” Ric said as he surveyed the damage he’d done to the fleshy part of his side. He was bleeding and it hurt like hell. But he’d figured if he hadn’t done it, Junior would’ve. And in shooting him, Junior wouldn’t have aimed for the exact spot where Ric had been shot just last year. The ER doctor who’d stitched him up had told him that he couldn’t have been hit by a bullet in a less invasive place if he’d tried. “How about it? Do I get the insane stunt bonus?”

Jules actually laughed. “Yeah.” But then he stopped laughing, his face back to grim.

Ric looked up to see what Jules had spotted, off to the ship’s starboard side.

Foley’s fishing boat. Had to be. It was still some distance away, but the gap was closing fast.

Annie had lit the fuse.

Okay—that was one scenario Robin hadn’t considered.

Jesus, she was badly hurt. She tried to push herself to her feet, but she didn’t get far.

“How long ago did you light it?” he asked.

“I don’t know,” she said. “Can we cut it? Or just…pull the fuse out?”

She reached for it, but he stopped her. “Don’t. I don’t know. I just…don’t know.” He’d never defused a bomb before—he didn’t know enough about it. He did know that dousing the fuse with water in an attempt to put it out wouldn’t work. It was called underwater time fuse for a reason.

Could he just pull it out? And if he could, why, in the movies, did people defuse bombs carefully, with sweat dripping down their faces? Why didn’t they just grab and yank?

No, Robin knew of only one way to be absolutely certain they would survive this—and that was to get off this boat and swim like hell.

He swung Annie up and over his shoulder and ran for the deck.

Jules handed Junior’s cell phone to Ric and began tying up Junior.

“Call Foley,” he said. “Tell him I’m dead, but that you’ve got Junior. Tell him you’ll make a trade. Junior for Annie.”

Ric was already accessing Junior’s phone book. Foley was right there, in the F s. He pressed the talk button and…

“It’s ringing,” he reported to Jules, who was now collecting weapons and ammunition from the men he’d killed.

“No one else has a phone,” Jules complained. “As soon as you’re done, I need to call Yashi for backup.”

“I’m getting bumped to Foley’s voicemail.” Ric was trying not to freak. He turned to Junior and asked, “How many men did Foley have aboard?”

“Fuck you,” Junior said, but Ric couldn’t hear him. He saw Junior’s mouth move, but the sound of his words were obliterated by the roar of an explosion.

He turned to see Jules staring out over the deck railing, horror on his face.

Jules’s mouth moved, too. No…

Ric spun to see what he was looking at, and realized that Foley’s fishing boat had exploded in a fireball.

Water shot up into the sky, and debris rained down into the Gulf.

The silence that fell was broken only by Junior. The son of a bitch was laughing.

Ric drew his sidearm.

“Don’t,” Jules said quietly.

“I don’t give a fuck”—Ric’s voice broke—“about finding al-Hasan.”

“Robin and Annie did,” Jules reminded him, and knocked Junior on the side of his head with the butt of his handgun. It looked almost gentle, the way that he did it, but Junior stopped laughing and immediately slumped unconscious.

Ric sat down on the deck.

Jules sat, too, holding out his hand for the phone.

“I thought we were going to do it,” Ric said as Jules dialed. “I thought…Robin was still alive, and…I thought…” He shook his head.

“I thought we had a chance, too,” Jules agreed. There were tears in his eyes. “I’m so sorry. Yeah, Yash,” he said into the phone. “It’s me. I’m here with Ric. I’m somewhere off Sarasota on…” He paused. “You what?”

The change in his voice made Ric look up.

“He called when?” Jules pushed himself to his feet. “Backup’s already on its way,” he told Ric, repeating information he was getting from Yashi. “There are ten helicopters—six of them military—heading in our direction, ETA twenty minutes. They were called in about four minutes ago by Robin. You were right, he didn’t drown—holy shit. Yeah, yeah, Yash…” He held out a hand to help Ric up, then led the way to the bridge, speaking again to Ric. “He wants us to try to send out a radio signal—an SOS—from the bridge, so they can get an exact…Yash, listen. Tell the pilots there’s a big column of smoke. A fishing boat just exploded and…We’re right there. They can’t miss us.”

Ric followed him up the stairs to the yacht’s control room. There was a huge steering wheel, right in front of floor to ceiling windows. He went over to it.

“Steer toward the wreckage,” Jules ordered him.

It didn’t budge. “The wheel’s locked,” Ric reported.

“Yashi,” Jules said into Junior’s phone. “I need info on how to get this thing out of autopilot and how to slow it down. ASAP.” He looked at Ric, hope back in his eyes. “They were alive four minutes ago.”

“Four minutes ago,” Ric pointed out, “was before that blast.”

“Shit,” Robin said. “They’re heading toward us.”

Robin had told Annie that Junior’s yacht seemed to be on a course that would pass the wreckage. But now, apparently, they’d turned.

The salt water had finally stopped stinging Annie’s multitude of cuts and scrapes as she and Robin clung to a floating bench cushion he’d grabbed on his way off the boat. Well, Robin clung—both to the cushion and to Annie. Her ability to cling to anything was limited by her injured wrist.

“Leave me here,” Annie told Robin.

“What?” he said. “No way.”

“Please,” she said. “You’re a strong enough swimmer—you can make it to shore.”

“I’m not leaving you,” he said. “You’re hurt.”

“You have to,” she said. “If Junior finds us, Ric and Jules will die. I don’t want them to die.”

“Help is coming,” Robin promised her. “We just have to hang on a little bit longer.”

Yashi was the man.

He’d helped Jules and Ric gain control of the yacht’s steering system, and shut down the engines.

Of course a ship didn’t have brakes, so they still moved forward. But they were slowing rapidly as they circled the wreckage.

Jules stood at the railing next to Ric. They were using binoculars to search the water for survivors. It was so damn choppy, and there were bits of things floating all over the surface of the water and…

Wait a sec…

“One o’clock,” Jules told Ric. “That’s definitely someone out there, isn’t it?”

Ric shook his head. “I can’t tell.”

Whatever it was, they were moving closer to it and…

“I’m going in,” Jules decided. He kicked off his sneakers and went over the rail with a splash. He swam underwater as far as he could, telling himself not to hope too hard.

But it was too late—hope had kicked in. Mere minutes ago, Robin had called for help. God couldn’t be so cruel to have let him survive these past few hellish hours only to kill him four ridiculous minutes before Jules and Ric kicked Junior’s ass.

But then Jules got close enough to see that the thing he’d spotted was a body—but it had been torn almost in half by the blast. It was floating facedown and…

God!

It was Foley. And not only had someone done some serious damage to his right eye, but he also had a bullet hole in the center of his forehead. Jules treaded water for a moment, trying to catch his breath and calm his pounding heart.

Was finding Foley like this a good thing or a bad? He didn’t know. But God, he wanted Robin and Annie to be alive. Please God, please…

Jules quickly swam back to the yacht, to the rope that Ric had tied to the railing for him.

He’d only climbed halfway up the side, when Ric said, “Whoa. Whoa, wait. I see something.”

“Where?” Jules asked, turning to look, sweeping his hair back from his face.

“See that red thing?” Ric asked, pointing to a big piece of something red bobbing on the waves. “Right behind that, like they’re trying to hide.”

Jules dove back into the water.

“Shit,” Robin said again. Annie had been right. Junior was sending his men into the water to look for them. The sun was too bright for him to see Junior at the railing. It created a glare off the white hull of the huge ship, blinding him. Still, he’d caught a double flash that could only have come from binoculars.

And then he saw a splash as someone went into the water.

“Go,” Annie said. “Please, Robin, they don’t know you’re alive.”

“I’m not leaving you,” he said for, like, the four thousandth time. But he did pull Foley’s gun from where he’d tucked it in the back pocket of Annie’s jeans.

“What are you doing?” she said just as someone surfaced about three feet away from them.

Robin had no idea if this type of gun could fire after being immersed in water, but he held it as if it did. “Back off!” he shouted, about to pull the trigger to see what would happen when…

“Jules?” Annie said.

Jules.

“Oh my God,” Jules said as he treaded water. “That would’ve really sucked.”

Robin let his hand drop into the water with a splash. Holy, holy shit, he’d almost shot Jules.

“I can’t believe you’re both all right. Are you all right?” Jules asked. The expression on his face as he looked into Robin’s eyes was one Robin would remember for the rest of his life. It was as if Jules had been granted a reprieve from an eternity in hell. Robin could relate, because he was feeling the exact same thing.

He nodded. He was all right. Because Jules was alive…

Jules took immediate charge, gently prying the gun from Robin’s fingers even as he turned, his full attention on Annie, who looked as though she’d been hit by a truck.

“How badly are you hurt?” he asked her, holding on to their float as he stashed the weapon at the small of his back.

“Where’s Ric?” was her urgent response.

“Ric’s fine,” Jules told her.

“Then where is he?” she asked.

“Broken wrist seems to be the worst of it, although she may have some internal injuries,” Robin answered for her.

Jules met his eyes and nodded before turning back to Annie. “Ric’s fine,” he repeated, trying to reassure her.

“Are you…Did you…escape…?” Robin asked.

“We have control of the yacht,” Jules told him as he moved closer to Robin now, looking at the welt he knew he had on his forehead. “Ric and me. Junior’s in custody. Are you sure you’re not hurt?” He touched Robin, just a hand on the side of his head, as if he needed solid proof that he was really there, and really in one piece.

Robin was holding on to Annie, but if he could have, he would’ve put both arms around Jules. And never let go, ever again.

Instead, he just grabbed Jules’s arm and squeezed. “I’m fine. Now,” he added. “Now that you’re here, I’m…” There were no words. Fine didn’t even begin to cut it.

“Me, too.” Jules’s response was heartfelt. “When we saw the fishing boat blow…”

“That was my fault,” Annie admitted.

“Yeah,” Robin said. He mimicked that old TV commercial, saying in a heavy Southern accent, “But ah helped.”

It made Jules laugh. But he was in FBI mode, so he didn’t hold Robin’s gaze for more than a few short seconds. “Help me get Annie to the yacht.”

But Annie had another agenda. “Jules, I’m sorry to be such a pain in the ass, but will you please define fine? I mean, if Ric’s so fine, where is he?”

Jules chose his words carefully as together he and Robin kicked to move the float—this time toward the yacht instead of away from it. “Someone had to stay with the ship, and, well…We just thought…Okay, this is going to sound bad, or at least worse than it is, but we both thought he should stay out of the water out of…well, fear that he might, um, attract…sharks?”

Sharks. Robin hadn’t even thought about sharks. They didn’t need Ric in the water to attract them—old dead Foley could do that well enough on his own. He kicked harder, moving them faster.

Meanwhile, Annie’s eyes had narrowed. “So he’s fine, but he’s…bleeding?”

“Um, a little?” Jules normally wasn’t such a terrible liar, but wow, that was pathetic, and he knew it, too. “He was shot,” he finally admitted.

“Shot,” Annie repeated.

But Jules was saved from having to give details because they’d reached the side of the ship. Ric had dangled a number of ropes over the side, but it was still going to be tricky getting Annie all the way up there, to that deck.

“Ric?” she shouted, looking up at the hulking side of the vessel.

“Annie!” he shouted back.

“Stay up there, Alvarado.” Jules joined the shouting. “We’ll bring her to you.”

“She’s hurt worse than she’s letting on,” Robin told Jules quietly as Annie shouted, “Are you all right?” to Ric.

“I know,” Jules said. “Junior played it over the ship’s intercom. They were trying to give us proof of life, and she wouldn’t do it. She finally screamed and…”

“I’m fine,” Ric shouted back to Annie. “Are you all right?”

“See?” Jules told her as they looped the rope under her arms. “Told you he’s fine.”

“I am now,” she called to Ric, echoing Robin’s words. Just moving her arm had to hurt like a bitch on fire, but she didn’t complain. She did look at Jules, though. “I thought Robin was dead,” she said. “Did you hear me say that, too?”

“Oh yes,” Jules said.

Jesus. Robin looked at him. “So you thought…”

“Yeah.” Jules touched him again, his hand warm and solid on the back of Robin’s neck. “I was having a really bad day for a while there.” He turned to Annie. “Sweetie, try to hold your wrist securely against yourself,” he told her, “to keep from jarring it as we pull you up.”

“It’s going to hurt,” Annie said. “I know. That’s okay, let’s just do it. I’m ready.”

She was. And Robin knew she would’ve endured anything. She would have walked through fire to get up onto that deck where Ric was waiting—Ric, who’d been shot. He could still see Annie’s worry for Ric in her eyes, despite all of Jules’s reassurances.

Yeah, she was ready for anything.

Jules was giving her a nod and his best you’re in good hands smile. “Okay.” He looked at Robin. “Get upon deck and help Ric with the ropes. I’ll help Annie.”

“For the record,” Robin told him, “I’m ready, too.”

Jules didn’t know what he was talking about. Or maybe he did, and he just didn’t believe it. “Just…go help Ric,” he said.

So Robin climbed the rope.

“Choppers ETA five minutes,” Ric reported as he tried to untie the rope that was beneath Annie’s arms. He had to delegate the task to Jules, because Annie was far too interested in checking out Ric’s injuries. “We’ve got paramedics coming.”

“You said he was shot,” she accused Jules, “not that he was shot twice. ”

“Shot’s also the plural,” Jules defended himself.

“I’m okay,” Ric tried to reassure her. She, however, was in serious pain. “Oh, Annie,” he said. She was going to have one hell of a black eye. And her lip…

But she ignored it completely and kissed him.

And that was it for him. Game over. Ric just sat there on the deck with Annie in his arms.

Robin came out from the galley with some ice wrapped in a dish towel. But he put it down within Ric’s reach, and as Jules had done, he silently and quickly faded away.

It was funny, really.

Ric would’ve thought a couple of gay guys wouldn’t be so freaked out by the sight of a grown man crying like a baby.

“I’m so sorry,” Annie whispered through her own tears, “that I screamed. I knew you were listening and I tried not to—”

“I’m sorry,” Ric said, “that I couldn’t keep Foley from hurting you.”

“It’s okay now,” she murmured. “Everything’s okay.” But then she lifted her head, misery in her eyes. “Oh, God, everything’s not okay. Ric, Martell was…They killed him.”

“No,” Ric told her. “He’s all right.”

She didn’t believe him.

“He’s in the hospital,” he said, wiping his face in the crook of his arm. “He’s already out of surgery. Yashi told me. He made quite a scene in the ER, but…He’s going to be fine.”

“Oh, thank God,” she said, relief in her eyes.

“Yeah,” he agreed. “I’m doing a lot of that right now. Thanking God.” He touched her poor, bruised face, and yeah, there came the waterworks again.

“Jules told me…Did you really shoot yourself?”

Ric nodded, laughing now, too.

She was looking at him as if he’d gone mad. “You’re always telling me that’s not funny, but that’s really not funny.”

“Yeah,” he said. “It kind of was. See, I wanted Junior to think I’d killed myself, so there had to be blood. But I didn’t want to hit anything vital and…I also had to fall back and not move and…dead people generally don’t scream shit, shit, shit, because it hurts, you know? But, Christ, it really hurt.”

Now she was laughing, too, but more with horror than with humor. “God, Ric…”

He kissed her again. Gently. Careful of her battered mouth. “I wanted to live,” he told her. “It was an imperative.”

And that got her tears going again. Between the pair of them, they were just never going to stop. “God, I love you,” she told him. “I should have told you—”

“It’s okay.” He cut her off. “I know. I knew. I love hearing you say it, but…Annie, I knew.”

She kissed him.

And he knew that she knew that he loved her, too.

“That’s when Annie lit the fuse,” Robin told Jules as they stood on the deck of Junior’s yacht, waiting for the fleet of helicopters to arrive. “She was ready to die to save Ric. You, too, but really…Ric.”

Robin was leaning both elbows on the railing. Dressed only in his boxers, he was quite the sight, with all that smooth, tan skin and his tousled blond hair. Jules just stood there, next to him, drinking him in.

Jules still couldn’t believe that his cover had been blown thanks to cell phone video footage taken of him both in Robin’s room and last year, during that hostage goatfuck. Next time he went undercover, he’d have to change his hair and eye color—maybe even grow a beard.

“She loves him,” Robin continued. “And she’s lucky, because he loves her, too. Most people don’t find that. You know. That kind of…equal adoration.”

No kidding. Jules stood there, lost for a moment in Robin’s eyes. But then Robin looked away.

Something was definitely up. Robin was acting oddly. “I, um, saw Foley’s body,” Jules said. “Are you…okay?”

Robin nodded vigorously. “Yes, I am. My big regret is that I can’t kill him again and make it hurt even more this time.” He turned to look at Jules. “Are you okay?”

“Yeah,” Jules said, even though he couldn’t keep himself from shaking his head no. He was both the most okay and the furthest from okay that he’d ever been in his life. “I’m just…still really…” God help him, he needed…Robin. He needed to hold on to him for about a week, just to convince himself that this wasn’t some dream that he would wake up from, to find he really was dead and forever gone.

But Robin had turned away again, staring down into the water.

Enough was enough. “What aren’t you telling me?” Jules asked. “Did Foley…hurt you, or—”

“No,” Robin said. “Jesus, no.”

“Then, are you, like, breaking up with me?” Jules asked.

That got him eye contact, at least. And some of the despair was displaced by a glimmer of hope. “Are we together?”

“Damn straight,” Jules said. “Well, you know what I mean.”

And that got him a smile, although it faded much too fast.

Jules touched him, his shoulder, his arm. “Talk to me.”

Robin closed his eyes. “God, I want to kiss you.”

Jules looked at his watch. “In about three minutes, we’re going to be surrounded by helicopters, so, since I really want to kiss you, too—”

“See, here’s the thing,” Robin said. “If I kiss you, you’ll know that I had a drink—” He stopped himself. “Yeah, right. A drink? Try a bottle. I was starting to detox, Jules, and God, I was sick.” He was so upset, he was on the verge of tears. “I was pretending it was the flu, but Annie…She, like, wiped my face in the truth. She told me I was going through withdrawal. She said I need to detox in the hospital or I could die—because I’m…” He choked the words out. “…an alcoholic.”

Robin looked so miserable. He was so distressed, so ashamed.

Yet all Jules could think was…Alleluia.

“I’m so sorry,” Robin said. “I broke my promise to you.”

“Sweetie, God, come here.” Jules reached for him, and this time, instead of turning away, Robin grabbed hold of Jules so tightly, it took his breath away.

Dear Lord, what Robin and Annie must’ve gone through. Jules suspected the story that Robin had told him was the Cliff’s Notes version.

And then I went overboard, and after Foley thought I was dead, I just…climbed back aboard the boat. It was obvious now that none of it had been quite as easy as Robin had made it sound.

“I’m just like my mother.” Robin’s voice was choked.

“No, you’re not,” Jules told him, his heart in his throat. “You’re nothing like her. She never admitted she had a problem. She never asked anyone for help.”

“I need help,” Robin said. “Will you help me?”

“Yes,” Jules said. “I’m here. I’m with you—whatever it takes.” He used Robin’s own words. “I’m yours.”

Robin smiled, but there was still massive unhappiness in his eyes. “Look, I totally suck. I violated your privacy. I read that e-mail you got from Sam. The one where he said a relationship with me would hurt your career…?”

“Robin.” Jules shook his head.

“I’m sorry. I know I’m a bad person…”

Jules laughed. “No, you’re not. It’s just…you should know better. Or at least know enough to realize that if you’re going to read someone’s e-mail, don’t just read half of it—read it all.”

“I did,” Robin said.

“You read what I wrote back to him?” Jules asked. He’d used the word love in that e-mail, way more than once.

Robin nodded. “And also what Alyssa wrote back to you.”

“Alyssa e-mailed me?” Jules asked. “From Spain?”

Robin nodded again.

“What did she say?”

As Jules watched him, he knew Robin was considering pretending that he didn’t remember. But he clearly didn’t want to lie to Jules, so he finally told him. “She said, go for it. ”

Jules nodded. It was exactly what he’d expected Alyssa to say. “You know, I often take her advice.”

“So your whole career,” Robin clarified. “You’re just going to throw it away. For me.”

“Maybe,” Jules told him. “Maybe not. Maybe I can have it all.”

“What if you can’t?” Robin asked.

“Then I’ll be happy with what I’ve got,” he said quietly, “because I’ll have the most important part.” Jules touched his face. “I spent a large part of today believing you were dead,” he said, “and none of that other stuff mattered. All I knew was that I was never going to smile again. I was never going to be able to look into your eyes and…You always know what I’m thinking and what I’m feeling and…You know me. And you love me anyway. I thought I’d lost that forever. I thought I’d lost you.”

Robin had tears in his eyes again. “That’s what you wrote in that e-mail. That’s the way you told Sam that you love me.”

Jules stepped back from him. “Yeah,” he said. “That’s the way I love you. And that’s the way you love me, too. You know, not everyone finds that. Not everyone’s that lucky.”

Robin reached for him again.

But Jules shook his head as he took another step away. “Robin, the helicopters are here.”

Robin looked up into the sky as if he were surprised. Had he really not heard them coming? Apparently not. Most of the helos were equipped to land on the water, but one was smaller, and just circled endlessly overhead. A logo for Channel 7 was on its belly.

Jules followed Robin’s gaze up to it. “Yeah,” he said. “Smile for the camera. Yashi told me a news copter caught a whiff of the activity and followed everyone out here.” He smiled at Robin. “I’ll kiss you later. Count on it.”

But Robin caught him around the waist anyway, tugging him closer.

“Robin.” Jules resisted. “I can wait for three movies. For you to come out. I’m okay with that. I really am.” He was willing to wait forever if he had to.

But Robin kept pulling him. Closer and closer, into an embrace.

Jules was hypnotized by the feel of Robin’s body against his, by Robin’s mouth so tantalizingly close, by the love in Robin’s eyes. But even as he wrapped his arms around this man he wanted to spend the rest of his life with, he insisted, “I can wait.”

Robin just smiled. “Yeah, but I can’t,” he said, and he kissed him.

Right in front of the whole, wide world.