[ - ]
Table of Contents [Report This]
Printer Chapter or Story Microsoft Word Chapter or Story
- Text Size +
“I’m sorry; what did he say?!” Lauren leapt off of the couch with surprising agility. “I’m going to fucking murder that good-for-nothing, shit-ass ...”

“Lo ...” Kristin coked her head ever-so-slightly in Rochelle’s direction. “...maybe you should just, you know, sit ...”

“What?” Lauren paused mid-rant. She swivelled her eyes to Rochelle who was standing in the middle of the room sobbing silently; her unfocused eyes trained on the television. “Oh ... oh shit! Oh my God, Ro! I’m so sorry! I didn’t mean ... I just meant that ... ‘murder’ was definitely the wrong word ...”

Lauren promptly sat back down on the couch. She pressed her mouth into a thin line as she stared at her husband’s face on the screen. Nick looked absolutely destroyed; like he would rather die than choose between the Kentucky cousins. And that’s exactly what Lauren was afraid of. She could practically see the wheels turning in Nick’s head; see him toying with the idea of turning the gun on himself instead of on Brian or Kevin. As much as she loved the other guys, Lauren couldn’t help but hope that Nick would decide to be selfish. She hoped that he would think about her, about their son.

“Why aren’t the police there yet?” Baylee broke the silence. “Why are they letting all of this happen? It’s not fair! It’s not fair to make Nick pick!”

“None of this has been fair, Bay.” Leigh sighed. She had no idea what to say to the young boy sitting across from her. His raw, unfiltered pain was breaking her heart. “Life isn’t always fair. It doesn’t matter how good you are, or how much you pray, or well you follow the rules. Sometimes life just deals you a shitty hand.”

Baylee licked his lips. He felt like he was seeing the world for the first time. The relationships that he had thought were stable were not, the people who he had thought were moral were not, and the values that he had thought were important were not. The adult world had just rushed forward and beaten him with a stick; shattering his rose-coloured glasses into thousands of tiny pieces. He would never look at his life the same way again.

“I don’t understand.” Rochelle choked. “I just don’t understand. They shot him. They shot him for no reason! They shot my Alex, and now I’ll never get to see him again. I’ll never get to hug him, or kiss him, or say goodbye. I’ll never get ...”

“Ro, honey, you have to stop!” Kristin vacated her spot next to Baylee and pulled Rochelle into a crushing hug. “I don’t have any words for you right now, but I’m here for you, okay? We’re all here for you.”

Baylee lifted his head to look at his mother. He didn’t understand why his mom wasn’t talking; why she wasn’t also trying to comfort Rochelle. Leighanne was just sitting on the couch and staring at the television in a daze as if she was the only person in the room. Baylee’s stomach lurched. His mom cared about the other guys just as much as she cared about his dad, didn’t she?

“Where are the police?” Baylee repeated his earlier question to silence the doubts that were growing in his own mind. “What’s taking them so long?”

“We’re almost there.” Nate announced. “The plaza’s just after the next set of lights.”

Julie nodded. Her mind was swimming. She glanced down at her phone screen. They had lost AJ somewhere between the downtown core and their destination, but the others were still alive. All of her grand visions of bursting into the room with the SWAT team and rescuing all five Backstreet Boys had disappeared as soon as AJ’s body had hit the floor. Time definitely wasn’t on their side and, although nobody on their team was willing to admit it out loud, their mission had already switched from rescue to recovery.

“Gardner and Vasques came up empty at their branch.” Nate continued. “So did Nelson and Lewis.”

Julie nodded again. She was barely listening.

“Both teams are holding steady for now. They’ll be on route as backup as soon as we or Parker and Brown have an address.” Nate paused. He let out a small sigh as he studied his partner’s face. Something was clearly wrong. “You okay, Gallagher?”

“I’m just thinking about how we blew it.” Julie replied. “We messed this entire situation up, Nate. AJ’s death is our fault.”

Nate resisted the urge to roll his eyes. Julie had been overly invested in this case from the moment that it had come across their desks. He should have trusted his gut; he should have had her pulled off of the file at the very beginning. It was obvious that she was letting her emotions get in the way.

“I know what you’re going to say, Nate. I know that you’re going to tell me that we’re doing the best job that we can possibly do given the circumstances. I know that you’re going to tell me that it’s our responsibility to apprehend the criminals and nothing more. But you’re forgetting that all of that knowledge isn’t going to change the fact that our names are forever going to be synonymous with the death of the Backstreet Boys.” Julie let out a sigh to match her partner’s. “You do realize that if they all end up dead, our careers will be too, right?”

Nate ran his tongue along his front teeth. Julie had made a good point. Regardless of how hard they tried, the media wasn’t going to tell their side of the story if things ended badly.

“344A, this is 567A. Are you still on route? You need to redirect! I repeat; you need to redirect! We have an address! Over.”

Julie practically flung herself at the hand-held radio. She yanked it off of the dashboard before Nate could react. “567A, this is 344A. We are still on route to our initial destination, but we will redirect. What’s the address? I repeat, what’s the address? Over.”

Julie held her breath as she waited for the other pair of detectives to respond. The fact that Parker and Brown had managed to retrieve an address before she and Nate had even made it to their destination filled her with a renewed sense of optimism. She glanced down at the phone in her lap; four Backstreet Boys were still standing.

“344A, the destination is 23 Bedford Road. The primary suspect’s name is Carlos Costa, but he’s known to refer to himself as ‘Carl’. Over.”

“Copy that, 567A.” Julie’s fingers were shaking so badly that she could barely press the button on the radio. Nate was already punching the address into the GPS system. “567A, 344A is now on route to 23 Bedford Road.” Julie gripped the arm rest as Nate abruptly pulled the car into a u-turn and accelerated at an alarming rate. “We will advise SWAT of the new destination. Over.”

“344A, we copy. We will inform 278A and 459A of the change. Over.”

“567A, we are twenty-two minutes from the destination. Over.”

Julie looked to the GPS for confirmation. Her palms were sweating. This was it; they finally had an address.

The sweat was running down Nick’s face; mixing with his tears and dripping off of his chin in massive, salty drops. He didn’t want to be in this position. He didn’t want to make the choice. As soon as he had been given the ultimatum, he had thought about turning the gun on himself. But, deep down, he knew that killing himself would be selfish. Even if he were to shoot himself in the head, there would be nothing to stop the two angry men from killing Brian, Kevin, and Howie before his body had even hit the floor.

“Are you having trouble deciding, Nicky?” Angelo smirked. “Do you want them to play rock, paper, scissors?”

Nick took a deep breath in an effort to stop the tremors that were racing through his body. He knew that their captors weren’t going to wait forever. He knew that things would only get worse if he didn’t pull himself together and make a decision. Taking another gulp of air, Nick squared his shoulders and forced himself to look at Brian and Kevin.

The Kentucky cousins were still flattened against the far wall with their arms outstretched and their fingers laced together. They were both staring back at Nick with similar expressions of finality and acceptance. The sight of them looking so eerily calm made Nick cry even harder. Why couldn’t the two of them have just looked terrified? It would have made things easier. The notion that both Kevin and Brian were willing to accept whatever decision he made was too much for him to handle.

“Maybe I haven’t made myself completely clear.” Angelo rolled his eyes. He was growing increasingly impatient. “You either shoot Brian, or you shoot Kevin, or I kick the final riser out from underneath Howie’s feet.”

“You sick son of a bitch!” Howie wheezed. “Why don’t you just kick it out from under me now then?”

Angelo turned to face the struggling Latino. The expression on his face was priceless; terror laced with a tinge of bravado. It was easy to see that Howie didn’t mean what he was saying, that he was only trying to save Nick. Angelo snorted. What was it about the stupid blonde that made everyone want to protect him? Even his adoring fans had gone out of their way to make sure he didn’t win the final challenge; essentially sacrificing the life of another man to save their precious Nickolas.

Nick’s heart was straining against his chest. He knew that Howie was lying through his teeth. Howie didn’t want to die. None of them did. His eyes drifted to AJ’s body. They were already down to four.

“What’s it gonna be, Nick?” Angelo prodded. He stepped closer to Howie and tilted his foot so that the sole of his boot was resting against the riser. “Who are you going to pick? Who means the least to you? Which one of these losers could you live without?”

Nick hastily wiped at his face with the back of his free hand. He knew what he had to do. He knew that he only had one chance to make the right decision. Taking one final deep breath for good measure, he planted his feet and raised the gun.

Fighting the urge to cry even harder than he already was, Nick pulled his arms straight and gripped the handle of the gun with both hands. He pivoted slightly so that he was directly facing Brian and Kevin. The two cousins were still staring at him; Kevin had gone stone-faced and the tears were now rolling down Brian’s cheeks. Nick moved his right index finger over the trigger and removed the safety. His vision blurred slightly from the tears that he could no longer contain.

“It’s okay, Nick.” Kevin’s voice was deep; too deep for comfort. “It’s okay.”

“You guys know – you both know that I love you, right?” Nick fought to keep his arms steady. He knew that he couldn’t afford to miss his target.

“We know.” Brian’s voice was barely audible. He raised his teary eyes to Nick’s and squeezed his cousin’s hand as he answered for both of them. “We know, Nick. We love you too.”

Nick slowly let out his breath. His finger twitched against the trigger. Before he could convince himself to change his mind, he yanked his finger backwards. The gun discharged with enough force to send him stumbling back several steps. Like with the bullet that had struck AJ, the silencer muffled the sound of the bullet leaving the chamber but it did nothing to distort the heart wrenching cry of pain that followed.

Kayleigh’s heart stopped. Sophia was gripping her fingers so tightly that she was practically cutting off the circulation to her entire arm. The iPad was propped up on the coffee table amidst their empty Starbucks cups and take-out containers of Chinese food. The images on the screen were still flashing. The wounded screams were still pulsing out of the speakers. The disbelief was still so fresh.

“I just can’t ...” Sophia breathed. “I can’t believe that he actually pulled the trigger.”

“What was he thinking?” Kayleigh shook her head. She could feel the tears prickling the corners of her eyes. She knew that it was silly to cry over a group of men that she didn’t really know, but she couldn’t help herself. “Do you think that we voted the wrong way?”

“I don’t know anymore.” Sophia wiped away her own tears and reached for one of the discarded coffee cups; frowning when she realized that it was empty. “Maybe we just wanted to believe it so badly that we convinced ourselves that it was true. Maybe the two of them were never truly as close as we were made to believe that they were.”

Kayleigh was still shaking her head in denial. “I feel like my entire teenage existence was based upon a gigantic lie. How could he do it, Soph? How could he shoot him like that? How is it possible that we just watched Nick Carter shoot Brian Littrell?”