All Through the Night: A Troubleshooter Christmas by Suzanne Brockmann

reached into his inside jacket pocket and pulled out a business card.
    It was bent and slightly battered around the edges, kind of like the man himself.
William Schroeder,
Jules read. The Boston Globe.
    Oh, good. The
Globe.
    â€œWho invited you?” he asked the man, working to keep his voice even.
    â€œNo one,” Will said. “I just…heard about the party and thought I’d show up. See if I couldn’t get in. See who I could talk to.”
    Robin. Damnit, he’d said he’d talked to Robin.
    â€œSo what do you want?” Jules asked. “Money? Because
that’s
not going to happen.”
    â€œWhat? No. God.” It was possible that Will really was offended. Or, he was simply a good bullshit artist. “I just, I don’t know, wanted to give you a chance to comment. On the record. It doesn’t have to be right now, we could set something up for later in the week. Do it right. Sit down, the three of us, and do a real interview.”
    Jules was already shaking his head. “I think you better leave.”
    Dolphina was back, and she was looking from Will to Jules and back. “Interview?” she said, horror in her voice.
    Jules handed her Will’s card. To her credit, she didn’t start to scream. But she was a good outside-of-the-box thinker, and she immediately started brainstorming. “Can we have him arrested?” she asked. “He crashed the party. He didn’t break and enter, but you don’t need to do that to make it a crime, do you? Home invasion. Isn’t that what it’s called?”
    â€œI’m betting someone invited him in,” Jules said.
    â€œYeah, but it’s not like he’s a vampire,” she countered hotly. “He knew he wasn’t really invited, yet he came in anyway.” She turned to Will. “You should be ashamed of yourself.”
    â€œI guess hooking up for drinks is off the table,” Will said.
    â€œYou think?” Dolphina said. “Can we sue him?” she asked Jules. “Or how about if we just kill him and bury him in the basement?”
    â€œNow, that
is
a crime,” Jules pointed out. “Mr. Schroeder was just leaving.”
    â€œI’d love to get a comment from you,” Will said, “at least about the news that the President’s going to be attending your wedding.”
    Jules looked sharply at Dolphina.
    But she was shaking her head. “We received his reply today,” she told him. “But it hasn’t been opened.”
    That was the last thing they needed right now. Not just the President attending—which would be bad enough—but news of it leaking out before they organized their game plan.
    â€œTime to go,” Jules told Will. “Do me a favor please, Dolph, and just…go find Robin?”
    It was then that the doorbell rang and kept ringing as if someone insane were out on the front porch.
    The locked door handle rattled, too.
    Jules pushed aside the curtains on the door’s window and…
    It was indeed someone insane out there—someone insane enough to be in the cold without his jacket on. Robin stood there shivering, and…Oh, God. The parts of him that weren’t soaking wet were covered in…mud? He had leaves matted in hair that was plastered to his head.
    But he was grinning at Jules and pointing to the sky, where the rain had finally changed from sleet to big, white, fluffy snowflakes.
    Jules yanked open the door. “What happened? Are you all right?”
    â€œI got locked in the basement—had to crawl out the window.” Robin shrugged it off. “Look, babe, it’s
snowing
!”
    His delight was contagious as he pulled Jules outside with him, then jumped down the steps to spin around on the sidewalk in front of their house, snow falling on his face, in his open mouth, in his muddy hair.
    â€œHey, Will.” Robin greeted the reporter with a wide smile, as Will buttoned up his