Christmas Waltz Page 9

  He murmured, “There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.”

  I closed my eyes. “Hamlet. Act 2. Scene 2.”

  “Very good.” There was a smile in his voice. His fingers, slim and dry and cool, sent little chills of pleasure over my scalp.

  “We haven’t done so badly, have we? We’ve lasted longer than any other couple we know. We’re certainly happier than any other couple we know.”

  I moved my head in assent. “Showfolk.”

  He chuckled. “We’re showfolk.”

  The fire snapped and crackled. Ross was silent, and I wondered if he was nodding off. When I turned my head, he was staring into the fireplace. The flames threw shadows across his face.

  “Do you ever regret—” I started softly.

  But he smiled again and shook his head. “No. I don’t. None of it.” His eyes shone in the firelight, studying me. “Do you?”

  “I got everything I wanted.”

  “So did I.”

  I curled my lip. He said, “I didn’t know what I wanted until you.”

  I turned my head so he couldn’t see the tears.

  The grandfather clock began to chime midnight. Soft, sonorous bell tones.

  One.

  Two.

  “Make your Christmas wish,” Ross said. He sounded indulgent, as he so often did with me. As though I were still that emotional and desperate boy of so long ago.

  Over the past year he’d had two strokes. Very mild. You’d have to know him well to ever tell.

  I closed my eyes and wished. Twenty more years…

  Death in the Afternoon Cocktail

  Also called Hemingway Champagne—Hemingway claims to have invented this one.

  Ingredients

  3 tablespoons (1½ ounces) absinthe

  ½ to ¾ cup (4 to 6 ounces) cold champagne or sparkling wine

  Directions

  Pour absinthe into champagne flute. Add champagne until a milky cloud appears, then serve.

  SO THIS IS CHRISTMAS: Adrien and Jake

  (This is actually a deleted scene.)

  Well, baby, I’ve been here before

  I’ve seen this room, and I’ve walked this floor

  I used to live alone before I knew you

  But I’ve seen your flag on the marble arch

  And love is not a victory march

  It’s a cold and it’s a broken Hallelujah

  I was humming along with Rufus Wainwright performing Cohen’s “Hallelujah” as I ran up the stairs to Jake’s office.

  “Hey,” I said. “I didn’t think you were coming back this afternoon.”

  I stopped in the doorway. Jake stood at the window that overlooked the alley behind the building. I couldn’t see his face, but something about the set of his shoulders silenced me. Took my breath away, in fact.

  It wasn’t defeat exactly. But I got a sense of…weariness that went beyond the physical.

  “Jake?”

  He tensed, as though he hadn’t heard me. As though his mind was a million miles away.

  “Yep?”

  That glimpse of his eyes froze my heart for a second or two.

  He sounded brusque, but that was because…because guys like Jake did not cry. Not when they lost jobs they loved. Not when their marriages broke up. Not when their families wouldn’t talk to them.

  Maybe he’d cried when Kate lost the baby. He’d never said.

  I’d never ask.

  He was not crying. His eyes were a little red. It could even be allergies. He probably was genuinely…weary.

  Or it could be the result of meeting Kate today. Of course he would feel regret. Wish he’d made different choices. Maybe he was comparing the might-have-beens against the what-he-was-left-withs.

  “Everything okay?” I could hear the mix of wariness and worry in my voice.

  His smile was twisted, but some of the bleakness in his eyes faded. “Yes.”

  “You’re sure?”

  He walked toward me, still smiling that crooked smile. I didn’t realize I had left the doorway until I met him halfway.

  I slid my arms around his neck; he wrapped his arms around my waist.

  He said softly, “I’m very sure.”

  Black Orchid Cocktail

  Currently my—and Adrien English’s—favorite cocktail.

  Ingredients

  1 ounce Skyy Raspberry Vodka

  1 ounce DeKuyper Blue Curacao

  1 ounce DeKuyper Watermelon Pucker

  Splash: cranberry juice

  Directions

  Fill shaker with ice. Pour ingredients into icy shaker. Shake it, baby. Pour into martini glass.

  JEFFERSON BLYTHE, ESQUIRE: Jefferson and George

  George had been definite. He could not make it back to the States for Christmas.

  “You can’t ask for the holiday off?” I’d asked. Since George hadn’t been home in four years, I thought maybe he could reasonably make that request—and that it might even get a thumbs-up from Corporate. Or whatever code name they used for CIA London. But nope. George declined to even ask.

  Which sort of…hurt. We hadn’t seen each other since Merry Old E., and that had been five months ago.

  Half a year. If we rounded up. Which is the rule in life as in math. Round up.

  Was this more of George testing me, of me needing to prove I was really, honestly invested? Or was it George losing interest?

  ’Coz it felt like George losing interest.

  A couple of times I even thought I should ask him outright. Dude, are we through and you just don’t want to break my heart or something?

  In my place, George would have asked outright. And if I asked outright, he’d tell me.

  But I didn’t ask. I just kept hoping I was wrong. I needed something to hang on to, and poor George was it.

  The deal I’d made with my parents was that I’d do a year’s apprenticeship with my dad in his architectural firm while I figured out where I was going to go to film school—assuming I could get in anywhere.

  I could get in somewhere as it turned out. I could get in LFS. The London Film School. I’d applied for the following year. And I’d been accepted.

  But was I going? I felt like it kind of depended on George. He hadn’t asked, and I hadn’t told him.

  My parents, of course, believed I’d change my mind about the whole film-school thing. Also the whole being-gay thing, which they attributed to ongoing upset over getting dumped by Amy and being confused and lost and generally…young. They figured I had turned to George because of timing and trauma.

  It was the first time I ever heard that fighting bad guys could make you gay, but okay. Interesting take on law enforcement. Anyway, I had my stuff to work through, and they had theirs.

  It wasn’t as bad as I’d thought, working for my dad. I didn’t hate architecture. Not at all. Architecture is a very cool gig, as a matter of fact. It just wasn’t how I wanted to spend my life. But as everyone I talked to pointed out, there were worse ways to spend your life, and not everybody got to do what they loved for a living. That was the point of having a hobby.

  My dad said the only thing that would really disappoint him was if I deliberately chose something I didn’t want for my future because I was afraid to talk to him. Which was a pretty solid 9.9 on the Dad Scale, grading from 1 (deadbeat dad) to 10 (rescues-kid-who-is-not-even-his-own-from-burning-building dad). Very nearly heroic, given how long he’d been planning on me joining the family firm.

  The holdup was not my parents. The holdup was George.

  And then very casually my mom mentioned that Mrs. Sorocco had said that George was coming home for Christmas.

  News to me.

  And that sort of hurt too. But was also exciting because…George. On the same continent at the same time. We might talk. We might do something besides talk.

  “So you are coming home for Christmas?” I asked George the next time we talked.

  He swore, and my heart sank. But then he sai
d gruffly, “Damn it. I wanted that to be a surprise.”

  “It is. I didn’t think there was a chance.”

  “No. Well…it’s not like I don’t have a stake in this too.”

  I wasn’t exactly sure what that meant, but it was probably the most promising thing he’d said yet. About anything.

  That was Christmas Eve.

  I went to bed that night trying to maintain in the face of my excitement that Santa was bringing me George.

  Or sort of. Because George literally arrived around two o’clock on Christmas Day and was whisked away into the family fortress. There was no opportunity for even a brush pass or whatever the hell the spy term was for a chaste hug hello. George waved at my window on his way into Sorocco HQ, and I waved forlornly back. The Berlin Wall couldn’t have seemed more insurmountable in those five seconds than Mr. Sorocco’s tidy boxwood hedge. The geometric squares of snow-covered lawn and shoveled driveway in front of our separate embassies could have been no-fly zones.

  George had dinner at his house, and I had dinner at my house.

  Diplomacy? Détente? Defection? I was more confused than ever as I tried to choke down turkey and gravy and mashed potatoes.

  “More stuffing?” my mom asked when I’d finally cleared my plate.

  I suspected she was being ironic, but the doorbell rang, and I practically knocked my chair over answering it.

  George stood on the stoop, framed in twinkling lights and the two potted, beribboned juniper shrubs. The Spy Who Wasn’t Sure If He Wanted to Come in from the Cold. He wore a dark overcoat and his most severe horn-rimmed specs. Flakes of snow melted into his neatly combed hair. He looked handsome and serious in a sorry-to-have-to-revoke-your-passport kind of way.

  “Hello, Jeffer—”

  I heard his oof as I knocked the wind out of him with my hello hug. Possibly more of a hello tackle.

  “God, George. I can’t believe you’re here.”

  Not dignified, I know. But sincere.

  “Hey,” he said in a very different tone of voice. His arms locked around me, and he hugged me back. Hugged me the way you’d expect to be hugged after you return from deep-space exploration. “Hey,” he said again.

  “I didn’t think you were ever going to get here.” I wasn’t just talking about arriving for Christmas, and I think he knew it because when I raised my head, he kissed me.

  He kissed me like he’d thought he was never going to get there either, and it made up for a lot.

  When we broke for air, he drew me out onto the step, pulled shut the door, and led me around the house and out to the backyard and up into the tree house.

  The floorboards were dusty with snow, and there were gaps between the planks. I could see the red berries of the holly bushes below. The bird bath looked like an ice sculpture. We hadn’t been up here in years. Maybe George thought we were under surveillance. If so, he was right. I pictured the Soroccos and my own parents with binoculars trained out the dining room windows.

  Anyway, he shoved a clear space for us and we settled together.

  My teeth were chattering—I hadn’t had time to stop for my jacket—and George took off his coat and wrapped it around my shoulders, and then wrapped his arm around me for good measure.

  “Poor old Jefferson. Has it been tough?” he asked sympathetically.

  “It’s been h-hell,” I replied, snuggling closer. “But not because of my family or friends or anything. That’s been…weird, but mostly okay. A lot of it has been good. Better than I expected.”

  He kissed the top of my head—like he was kissing my five-year-old self—and I said, “George, don’t.”

  Behind the severe glasses, his eyes were guarded.

  “You’ve got to listen to me,” I said.

  “I’m listening.”

  “Because this is unfair to both of us, and you’re going to wreck any chance we might have.”

  That expression I knew well. The lordly George of my teens. The George who firmly believed he knew best. Knew everything.

  Well, he didn’t. Not always.

  I headed him off with a quick, “No, listen, George. I know you’re doing what you think is best for both of us. You don’t want to hurt me, and you don’t want to get hurt again. I get all that. But there is no insurance policy for this. Maybe it’ll work out for us, and maybe it won’t, but it sure as hell won’t work out if we don’t try.”

  He opened his mouth again, but I kept talking.

  “And this…cooling-off period or whatever it’s supposed to be isn’t realistic anyway. If this is supposed to be for my sake, then it really doesn’t make sense because you’ve set up a scenario where I can’t move on. Because I’m still waiting for you.”

  “You’re not supposed to be waiting for me!”

  “But I am, George.” I couldn’t help the tears that sprang to my eyes. “Because I love you. You. And until I know for sure it won’t work, of course I’m waiting for you, of course I’m waiting for this stupid, ridiculous, fucking holding pattern to be over!”

  “Jefferson.” He sounded soft and regretful. “Don’t you see that defeats the purpose?”

  “What is the purpose, George? I don’t even know anymore. If you’re so sure it’s not going to work, that you don’t feel enough for me to really try, then tell me.”

  “I don’t,” he broke in.

  My heart stopped. I stared at him.

  His face twisted, and he said, “No, I mean I don’t think that. I would tell you if I thought that. I…want it to work. I love you. You know that. I want it to be right. But wanting it won’t make it true.”

  “Yeah, but it’s a start.” I had to wipe my face. I was so cold, I hadn’t even felt the tears falling until I was tasting them. “I don’t know why I ever agreed to this because it’s the worst idea ever. It’s completely illogical. The only way we’re ever going to know if it might work out for us is if we actually try.”

  He was silent. Offended that I dared to criticize his stragegy?

  “We’ve already put in half of the year you wanted.”

  “Five months.”

  “Close enough for government work.”

  His head bobbed, acknowledging a point.

  “I can’t take it, George.” I just didn’t have it in me to pretend anymore. No more of the cheerful, optimistic, adulting Jefferson of the last five months’ worth of phone calls. I could hear the weariness in my voice, and I think he could too. “If it’s a test, then I fail. I’m sorry. I just feel like you’re coming up with excuses not to be with me.”

  “I didn’t know you felt like this.”

  I said a little bitterly, “You didn’t want to know.”

  He seemed to be thinking that over. “That’s not true,” he said finally. Ever the intelligence analyst.

  “I can’t guarantee anything,” I said. “Except that I’m done. And if anyone ought to understand that people aren’t predictable, it’s a spy, George.”

  He made a funny sound. Not exactly a laugh. “Maybe so.”

  I sighed and rested my head on his shoulder. I could feel him thinking. I could practically hear the gears turning.

  “Okay, then,” he said slowly. “How do you see this working?”

  “I want to move to London and start LFS next year. Is that what you want?”

  Behind the glasses, his eyes were startled. “Well, yes.”

  “Is it?”

  “Yes.”

  “If you don’t want to live together, that’s okay, but I would like to—”

  “I would like to try living together,” he said. He still looked cautious, like he thought maybe I didn’t understand what I was saying.

  “You’re willing to live together?” I asked, equally cautious.

  “It makes the most sense.”

  “True.”

  He let out a shaky sigh—as though he’d been holding his breath for a long time. “There’s nothing I’d like more.”

  I raised my head to stare at him. “Well,
George, if you were going to give in so easily, what have we been waiting for all these months?”

  He was smiling. A sort of silly, sort of self-conscious smile that looked an awful lot like the George I used to know once upon a time. Before he became a secret agent and learned to hide everything he felt. Maybe even from himself.

  He said, “I think maybe…this. Maybe for you to see that I was always going to give in the first time you asked—and really meant it.”

  Christmas Punch

  This one is from Martha Stewart.

  Ingredients

  2 cups chilled pomegranate juice

  1 cup chilled cranberry juice (or blueberry-cranberry juice if you’re feeling daring)

  8 ounces (1 cup) vodka

  8 ounces (1 cup) Cointreau or other orange-flavored liqueur

  1 cup chilled club soda

  ½ cup fresh lemon juice (from 6 lemons)

  ½ cup Simple Syrup for Mixed Drinks

  Directions

  Combine pomegranate and cranberry juice, vodka, Cointreau, club soda, lemon juice, and simple syrup in a punch bowl. Fill glasses with cranberries frozen in ice cubes, and serve. Garnish with lemon slices if desired.

  About the Author

  Bestselling author of over sixty titles of classic Male/Male fiction featuring twisty mystery, kickass adventure, and unapologetic man-on-man romance, JOSH LANYON has been called “arguably the single most influential voice in m/m romance today.”

  Today Josh’s work has been translated into nine languages. The FBI thriller Fair Game was the first Male/Male title to be published by Harlequin Mondadori, the largest romance publisher in Italy. The Adrien English series was awarded the All Time Favorite Couple by the Goodreads M/M Romance Group. Josh is an Eppie Award winner, a four-time Lambda Literary Award finalist (twice for Gay Mystery), and the first ever recipient of the Goodreads All Time Favorite M/M Author award.