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Nick didn’t even bother arguing with him, but once they’d secured a flight to Miami and boarded, he turned to Howie as he was buckling his seatbelt and said, “You didn’t pack anything.”


Howie shrugged. “So?”


"So, you're flying with me cross-country with nothing but the clothes on your back."


"So? I've got a wallet in my back pocket and a family in Florida. I'll manage."


"But Annie's mom and dad live in--" Nick paused and clamped his mouth shut, then awkwardly corrected himself. "Lived in Boca Raton. Your house is in Orlando. That's like a three hour drive."


"So?"


Nick grunted and crossed his arms over his chest, then leaned his head against the window. "Thanks for coming with me," he said softly, holding his cell phone up weakly. “And everything else.” In his rush to get to Annie, he’d completely forgotten about the phone he’d dropped onto his bedroom carpet, and didn’t realize it was missing until he reached into his pocket to retrieve it and call Annie after booking a flight at the airport. Howie had calmly pulled it out of his own pocket and handed it to him. The same happened when Nick went to look for the boarding pass he’d left sitting on the ticket counter before checking in through security.


"No problem. I'm going to call Brian as soon as we land," Howie told him. “Do you think she’s called him yet?”


“Probably not.”


“Do you know if she had any appearances or studio time or anything scheduled in the next few days?”


Nick sighed. “There was some sort of benefit concert in Atlanta she was doing with Brian next weekend, and I know there was some other stuff, but I don’t remember the details.”


“Brian’s her manager. He’ll know,” Howie assured him. “That’s why we need to call him. Well, that, and he needs to know about this regardless. I’ll call Kevin and AJ and let them know we’ll be down here a few days. Maybe they can get up with Morgan and Prophet for a little while anyway.”


Nick nodded and stared out the window as thin clouds passed by in the bright blue sky. The weight of Annie’s tragedy bore down heavily on his shoulders and he unconsciously let out a sob.


“Nick?”


“I just wish I could have been there with her when she found out, you know?” Nick’s voice cracked as he attempted to explain himself.


Howie nodded in understanding and placed his hand over Nick’s on the tray table in front of him, giving it a little squeeze. “Was she alone?” he asked cautiously.


Nick shook his head quickly. “No. Her brother was listed as their emergency contact and the police called him first. His wife drove him down to Nashville from Lexington to tell her.”


“That’s good. And it’s good that she was in Nashville and not LA so they could get down there faster.” Howie reasoned.


Nick knew he was right, but that fact didn’t particularly make him feel any better. He sighed and turned to look back out the window. He’d been on his fair share of long flights, much longer than the four and a half hours it took to get from Los Angeles to Miami, but this was shaping up to feel like the longest flight of his life.

*********************


“What’s the address to the police station?” Nick jotted it down roughly with the pen he’d taken from the counter at the car rental agency onto his receipt as Josh recited it to him over the phone. “How is she?”


“Not good,” Josh admitted quietly. “We just finished ID’ing the bodies at the morgue. I told her she didn’t have to go with me, but she insisted, and--” He choked back a sob. “She examined them, Nick. She kept whispering all this medical jargon to herself. Eventually, a guard had to help me get her out of there.”


Nick blinked back tears as he let out an anguished groan. “Tell her I’ll be there soon.” What worried Nick the most was the eerie silence, save for Josh’s comments, on the other end of the line. He knew Josh would never leave his baby sister’s side, yet he didn’t hear her crying or anything. Not so much as a whimper, or a whisper, or a sob. He placed his hand on the handle of the driver’s side door, but Howie pecked on his shoulder from behind him.


“Give me the keys, Nick,” he demanded, holding his open palm out.


Nick obliged and ran over to the passenger side as Howie opened the door and climbed in. “Just hurry, okay?”


“I’ll do my best.”


They arrived at the Boca Raton Police Department in record time. Nick jumped out of the car before Howie had even put it in park, and started sprinting for the front door. Howie yanked the gear shift up and scrambled after him. There were several people milling about in the lobby waiting room. Nick looked around for Annie and Josh, but he didn’t see his fiancé , or her brother, a taller, more masculine replica with the same same shade of auburn hair, fair skin, and green eyes. A bored looking receptionist looked up at Nick when his hands slammed down heavily on the faux wood of the front desk. “Can I help you, sir?”


“I’m looking for Annie Morgan. She’s the daughter of Molly and Jack Donohue.”


“And you are?” She asked with raised eyebrows.


“I’m her fiancé,” Nick answered quickly.


The receptionist gave him a curt little nod and reached for the phone to her left. She punched in an extension and said, “Detective Jones, there’s a young man here inquiring about the Donohue case. He says he’s the daughter’s fiancé.” She paused while the detective’s deep, muffled voice spoke on the other end of the line. “Your name, sir?”


“Nick. Carter.” He tapped his foot on the dirty linoleum floor impatiently.


“His name is Nick Carter. And you are?” She looked over at Howie.


“He’s my friend,” Nick answered for him.


“Howard Dorough,” Howie added.


“And a friend named Howard Dorough,” the receptionist spoke into the receiver. “Thank you, detective.” She pointed to a door on her right. “Go through there and take a left. Then it will be the second door on your right.” She pressed a red button on the desk to buzz them in as Nick raced to the closed door and shoved it open. He jogged down the hall and skidded left, then came to a halt in front of the door. He placed his hands on the door frame and peered through the tiny window. In the dimly lit room, underneath a dangling light fixture, Josh was seated at a small wooden table across from a uniformed police officer and a man in business attire, who Nick assumed to be Detective Jones. The sleeves of his white oxford shirt were rolled up and the tie around his neck had been loosened, the top button of the shirt unbuttoned as he jotted notes down on a yellow memo pad. Annie sat on a worn out blue couch in the corner with her knees pulled up to her chest and her feet poking out from a beneath rough-looking jail issued brown blanket. She was shaking and shivering despite the blanket pulled tight around her shoulders and dried mascara tracks stained her ashen cheeks. He looked back at Howie and gulped, then flung the door open and ran inside. The men at the table stopped talking and watched Nick as he sank down to his knees in front of Annie and pulled her into his arms protectively.


“I’m so sorry, baby,” he soothed against her ear. She tensed under his grasp, but buried her face into the crook of his neck and sobbed.


“I’ll give you a minute,” the detective said somberly as he stood up and walked outside, the uniformed officer following him.


“You must be Josh.” Howie held his hand out to Annie’s brother. “I’m Howie. So sorry for your loss.” Josh nodded and gave Howie a firm handshake. They watched in silence as Nick and Annie cried together on the couch. After several minutes, Annie finally went limp in his arms, spent from her crying jag. Nick kissed her forehead and climbed up onto the couch beside her from his perch in the floor in front of her. She leaned into him heavily as he wrapped an arm around her shoulders, but still said nothing.


The detective cleared his throat as he opened the door and he and the police officer came back into the room. “For those of you just joining us, I’m Detective Kendall Jones. I’m handling this case.” He shook Howie’s hand, then turned to Nick and gave him a nod of acknowledgement. “This is Officer Matt Davis. He was the first responder on the scene after the housekeeper found Dr. and Mrs. Donohue this morning.” Both men sat down at the table again. “I’ve just finished talking with the medical examiner.” Annie bolted upright and jumped to her feet, dropping the blanket around her shoulders to the floor as she stood. Nick followed as she wobbled over to the table. He pulled the chair out for her and she sat down across from Detective Jones. “Your assessment of their injuries was spot-on, Dr. Morgan,” he told her. She gulped and nodded. There were only four chairs at the table, so Nick stood behind her and placed his hands on her shoulders. Howie casually and quietly walked over to the couch and sat down. “Both had multiple stab wounds that appear to have been inflicted by a simple kitchen knife. More specifically, judging by the size and shape of the wounds, it was probably a santoku knife-- a wide, sharp blade with a relatively dull point, usually used for chopping and slicing.”


Nick felt a wave of nausea wash over him as he took in the detective’s description of the murder weapon. He looked down at Annie to gauge her reaction, but she didn’t even flinch. She just stared blankly ahead.


“There’s an empty slit in the knife block on the kitchen counter, but we’ve yet to find the knife,” Detective Jones admitted somberly. “As far as motive, right now it basically looks like a robbery gone bad. My guess is that the intruder didn’t expect your parents to be such early risers and was unarmed. He-- or she- got startled when he found them eating breakfast in the kitchen and during the struggle, reached for the closest weapon he could find.”


“Dad always had to be at the hospital so early...” Josh muttered under his breath. “He said his body just wouldn’t let him sleep late after he retired.” He closed his eyes and bowed his head in frustration.


“Do you have any suspects?” Nick spoke up.


The detective sighed. “The perpetrator was very clean. We’ve yet to find any evidence that links anyone specifically to the crime scene. No finger prints that don’t belong to Jack or Molly. Not even the housekeeper.”


“She was new,” Josh clarified. “It was her first day. Mom always insisted on doing it herself, but her knees were getting bad, and....” He trailed off and quietly wiped away a tear that trickled down his bearded cheek.


Detective Jones gave him a sympathetic smile. “We’ve had a team there all day, Josh. We’re going to keep looking, but so far there’s no fingerprints, no footprints, not even so much as a hair or clothing fiber. It’s almost as if we’re dealing with a ghost.”