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** KEVIN **

I was kid-free and I was still making coffee at a quarter to six in the morning. Something was definitely wrong with this picture. I could feel the heaviness pulling at my eyelids as I divided the aromatic liquid into five large mugs. Once I had finished pouring, I returned the carafe to the machine and began brewing another pot. One cup each was not going to be enough to get any of us through the next few hours.

I loaded the steaming mugs onto a tray and walked carefully into the family room. Setting the tray on the coffee table, I selected one of the mugs and settled myself down next to Howie on the loveseat. AJ, Brian, and Nick had already claimed the larger couch and the three of them reached for their mugs in unison; each of them leaning back against the cushions and taking a long sip.

“Are you two alright?” I directed my question at Brian and AJ. “Neither one of you is hurt?”

They both shook their heads, but it was Brian who responded. “We’re probably going to feel it later, but right now we’re okay.”

“What were you thinking getting into a fight like that?” I lowered my mug to my lap and struggled to keep my voice even. I didn’t want them to know how rattled I was by the whole situation. “You could have been hurt.”

“What should I have done?” Brian challenged. “I wasn’t going to stand by and watch AJ get the shit kicked out of him.”

“I’m not saying that you shouldn’t have done what you did.” I struggled to make my point because I really wasn’t sure where I had been going with the conversation in the first place. “I’m just – I just think that ...”

“Kev, you were ready to join in.” Nick interrupted. “I know you were. So, why don’t we just drop it?”

I stared across the room at Nick and forced myself to keep my mouth shut. My eyes travelled across his tousled hair, his rumbled t-shirt, and the stubble that lined his face. Beneath it all, I could still see it; the anxious face of the little boy who had grown up before my eyes. His features were set in the same way that they always were when he wanted nothing more than for the five of us to get along. Nick was right; I needed to drop the subject.

“It hasn’t been this way for a long time.” I started again, taking a long sip of coffee.

“Hasn’t been what way?” Howie furrowed his eyebrows in my direction.

“The five of us; together, alone and sober.” I clarified.

AJ let out a raspy laugh and leaned his head back against the couch. “The last time we were together like this was when, in 1997?”

“It’s kinda nice.” Howie pointed out. “Minus the whole someone trying to kill us bit.”

“Maybe this is a blessing in disguise.” Brian spoke slowly. “Maybe this is a chance for us to fix things.”

“What needs fixing?” Nick looked anxiously at Brian. “Things are already back to normal.”

Before he continued, Brian exchanged a private look with Nick; a subtle, reassuring glance that only the two of them were meant to understand. “The fact that things are normal doesn’t necessarily mean that they’re the best that they can be.”

It was easy to dissect the meaning behind Brian’s statement by looking around the room. As usual, the five of us had unintentionally divided ourselves. Like any family, our quintet consisted of different pairings and clusters. Although those groupings had shifted slightly over the years, it had become blatantly obvious over the past few days that we were right back to where we had started; Brian, Nick and AJ versus me and Howie.

“There’s nothing to fix, Brian.” I gestured between the two couches. “This is the way it will always be. This is what works.”

Brian turned his strong gaze to my face. “We’re family, Kev.”

I started; not quite sure if he was referring to the two of us in the literal sense or to the five of us in the metaphorical sense. “I’m not questioning that.”

Brian sighed, clearly agitated that I wasn’t picking up on what he was trying to say. “I’m tired of being at odds with you most of the time.”

“Just because we disagree with each other doesn’t mean that our relationship needs fixing.” I stated. The light bulb had all of a sudden turned on. “You and I are as close as we’re probably ever going to be. I understand that now.”

“Do you?” Brian pressed.

I quickly did a mental recap of the past several months. To say that my relationship with Brian had been strained since I had officially returned to the group would be an understatement. I had unwittingly been harbouring some pretty intense feelings of resentment towards my cousin since I had made the decision to walk away in 2006.

I don’t really know what I had been expecting Brian to do, but I guess that I had secretly been hoping and waiting for him to make some grand gesture. I was the one who brought Brian into the group; therefore, he should have been the one to keep me in the group. After living through the last few days and believing that Nick was gone, the whole notion seemed petty and superficial. Brian couldn’t have forced me to stay even if he had made the effort; nobody could have.

“I get it.” I made sure to look Brian directly in the eyes as I spoke. “I’m sorry.”

“Do you guys need a minute or something?” AJ looked back and forth between the two of us. “Is this a Kentucky thing?”

“No, AJ.” I shook my head and laughed softly. “We don’t need a minute.”

“Are you sure?” Howie grinned. “It’s only 6:30 A.M. We have plenty of daylight hours left.”

I took another long swig of coffee as Howie mentioned the time. It was unbearably early to be up and fully awake. “This is going to be a really long day.”

“I have a feeling that it’s about to get even longer.” Howie muttered, his face falling. He nodded his head in the direction of the front door as the loud knocking began to resonate through the room. “Do we want to take bets on who it is?”

“My money in on the Guidos.” AJ narrowed his eyes as the knocking continued. “Haven’t they already done enough damage for one morning?”

I set my mug down on the coffee table with a sizeable sigh and got to my feet. It was pretty obvious that none of the other guys were going to make the effort to answer the door. “I’ll get it.”

Detective Eaton and Detective Bell were both staring at their phones when I answered the door; their mouths pressed into thin, straight lines. They looked stressed, but they were both impeccably dressed in complimentary brown suits.

“Do you guys ever wear jeans?” I asked as I held the door open.

“On occasion.” Detective Eaton informed me as he followed Detective Bell into the house. “Sorry to bother you so early in the morning.”

“It’s fine.” I shut the front door and began leading the way towards the back of the house. “I assume that you’ve spoken to Joey and Tony?”

“We stopped in across the street before we came over.” Detective Bell explained. “It seems as though Joey is going to need stitches to close the gash above his eye.”

“Stitches?” Brian’s anxious voice rang out as the three of us stepped into the family room. “Shit!”

“Don’t feel too badly, Mr. Littrell.” Detective Bell smirked. “From what Joey is saying, it was Mr. Carter who caused the damage.”

Nick returned the detective’s smirk. “It serves him right for attacking AJ.”

Detective Bell swivelled his eyes in AJ’s direction. “Joey really does feel badly about what happened.”

“It’s fine.” AJ reassured each of the detectives in turn as they both took a seat on the large, plush ottoman in the middle of the room. “I’m over it.”

I rejoined Howie on the couch, picking up my half-full mug of coffee as I sat down. “So, what brings the two of you here so early in the morning? I’m assuming that you don’t have good news.”

“You’re very astute, Mr. Richardson.” Detective Eaton frowned. “The media has become aware of the fact that Mr. Scott is our victim.”

I cringed. “When you say the media ...”

“It’s already become a worldwide headline.” Detective Eaton cut me off. “Television, print, radio, online, credible, gossip, tabloid, national, international; pretty much every type of media outlet that you can think of is talking about the fact that Mr. Carter is alive and well.”

I closed my eyes briefly and when I reopened them Detective Eaton was still staring me in the face. “What does this mean?”

“It means that the stakes just got a hell of a lot higher for the five of you.” Detective Bell deadpanned. “Mr. Scott’s killers now know that they murdered the wrong man, and they now know that the five of you have seemingly disappeared.”

“So, what you’re saying is that these psychos are now officially looking for us?” AJ interrupted. “We’re now legitimately being hunted?”

“Unfortunately, yes.” Detective Eaton removed his eyes from my face and turned to AJ. “All of this is no longer a precaution, Mr. McLean. You’re in real danger now.”

“Great.” AJ slumped back against the couch and folded his arms across his chest. “Just fucking great.”

“This arrived by email this morning.” Detective Bell pulled an envelope out of his jacket and handed it to me with a look of apology. “We still haven’t been able to trace the sender.”

I removed the single sheet of paper, even though I had no desire to look at it. I already knew what I was about to see. Just as I feared, I found myself looking at a set of promotional photos. Only, this time, the red ‘X’ had been removed from Nick’s face. Like before, there was a chilling line of text that incorporated our song lyrics: ‘Caught in the middle / And I’m tired of your games of hide and seek - - - - All Five Together Again’.

“Jesus.” Howie breathed over my shoulder. “These guys are seriously messed up.”

I passed the picture across the room to Nick without comment. I knew that there was no point in trying to hide it from the others; I had made that mistake once already.

“There has to be something that you can do.” Nick held the picture out to Detective Bell as if it were going to bite him. “You can’t just expect us to sit in this house and wait to be attacked.”

“We’re doing all that we can.” Detective Bell accepted the picture from Nick and I handed him the envelope. “You’re safe here.”

“What about our wives and our kids?” I demanded. “Are they safe?”

Detective Bell nodded reassuringly. “These people don’t want to hurt your families. They’re only interested in the five of you.”

“That being said, we have secretly disabled the Twitter account belonging to one of your wives.” Detective Eaton interjected. “We did it as a precautionary measure. Her recent tweets were leading us to believe that she might be on the verge of posting something that would somehow compromise your safety.”

Brian’s face immediately flushed with embarrassment. “It was my wife wasn’t it? What did she post?”

Detective Eaton exchanged a quick look with his partner. “It’s not important who it was or what they said. We’ve taken care of it.”

“We don’t really want to know anyway.” I gave Brian what I hoped was a supportive looking smile. His face was positively on fire and he was fidgeting uncomfortably. “You can disable all of their social media accounts for all we care.”

Nick nodded vigorously in agreement. “Yeah, go ahead and take it all down. Who cares about Twitter anyways?”

“We’ll see about that, if and when the time comes.” Detective Eaton stood up from his seat. “In the meantime, keep a low profile and make sure that you follow the house rules. As long as the five of you continue to do your part, we’ll be able to keep you safe.”

“We understand.” I spoke for the group as Detective Bell stood up to join his partner. “We’ll follow the rules.”