How's Montreal? Or how was it? I'm going to have to get used to this again. I will picture you in one city when I write to you, but you might be in a different one when you read it. Not that it matters...okay, now I'm the one that's babbling!! LOL!!

I enjoyed being with you and the guys. Terence and Patrick were very nice. Please thank them again for me. Hug all the boys...well, maybe not...I don't know what you guys are used to. It might frighten them!! LOL!!

Seriously, I learned a lot about you during the past week, about the things you do and what's important to you. I learned that touring isn't a big playtime. It's hard work with lots of anxiety and pressure in the middle of it and then some more hard work. When you need to vent, remember that you have a wife in Chicago with big ears.

Let me rephrase...LOL!!

Take care,
DW (Da Wife)
Abby

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

"When are we getting in?" asked Nick.

Terence looked at his watch. "Half hour, maybe. Forty-five minutes."

"I got time to email Abby?"

"Yeah, sure. Go ahead."

Nick lifted the lid on his laptop and settled down on the bench. Terence bent his head over a magazine, but he kept an eye on the younger man. Terence couldn't figure this out.

When Nick left Abby in Boston, a week ago, he was so distraught, he couldn't speak. That was natural, figured Terence. He'd just gotten married and now he was leaving his wife to go on tour. Who wouldn't be distraught? But Nick's recovery had been amazing. He bounced back and went on with the tour, almost as if Abby didn't exist. He emailed her every day and she emailed him every day, Terence knew. Nick would snort with laughter when he read her messages. Sometimes the messages were long, almost like letters, sometimes short notes. But only one a day. And then Nick would bounce off the bus and get ready to make music...or party with the guys or do interviews...meet the fans...it didn't matter, Nick was up for all of it.

They'd all noticed. Kevin had taken Terence aside and asked him if everything was okay with Nick. The fellas were kind of worried that he was sublimating his need for Abby and was going to blow apart. He never mentioned her and they didn't like to bring her up. Terence replied that they were in contact every day and that he seemed fine. That seemed to satisfy Kevin.

Gradually, the wedding talk died down. Nick wasn't forthcoming with any details in interviews. He wanted to talk about the music. He passed off the congratulations with a ‘thank you, I'm very happy' and then turned it back on the interviewer either by asking a question of his own or making a comment to one of the other guys, which brought them into the conversation. Since Nick hadn't married anyone in the entertainment world, it wasn't a big story anyway, and soon they didn't bother to ask.

Until Cincinnati.

Until Good Morning Tri-State.

Until Ross Davis.

Ross Davis was one of the hosts for the Cincinnati morning show. He didn't want to be a host for a Cincinnati morning show. He wanted to be a star. He was always looking for the break that would move him up to network level. He was sick of having to take part in stupid stunts. Last week, for God's sakes, he'd allowed himself to be stung by a taser gun for a report. The station gleefully reported that he'd not been hurt, only incapacitated for thirty seconds. But they had the video out on the website almost before he had recovered. Ever since the piece aired, his co-host had been teasing him about being stunned.

Ross Davis had moved around a lot before he landed in Cincinnati. He tried to make it sound good in his online bio. He'd won an award for his report on city buses running red lights in New Orleans. He'd been newsman of the year in Charlotte. He'd been Grand Marshall of the Thanksgiving Parade in Terre Haute.

But when you really looked at it, you saw that he moved around...not up. He never spent more than a couple of years in any one place. He would tell you it was because he was trying to get a wide variety of experience, to get to know America. The truth was that he was never happy. As soon as he landed a job, he was looking for the next one, a higher one. He wanted the network. He wanted Good Morning America.

He worked hard at his job. He did his research. He'd spent a lot of time on the ‘taser' thing and even with what he'd learned, he'd agreed to go along with it. This morning he was interviewing a couple of Backstreet Boys. He figured it would be a lot less dangerous, but potentially more rewarding. He did his research. He liked what he found.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Ronni waited a week. She wanted some time to pass between her conversation with James and the revelation. She wanted to be able to protest her innocence should the need arise. She still spent several hours a day on the message boards, posting indiscriminately about innocuous topics. She threw gasoline on an AJ fire and kept that going. She didn't want Nick to be the only topic of conversation. She spent a lot of her time picking innocent remarks out of postings and then commenting on them as if they were rumors, castigating the posters for even suggesting such a thing. She was painting at least two of her personas as vigilant watchdogs of justice.

Ronni waited to hear from the moderators. She knew that they sent personal emails to troublemakers and warned them against mischief. But she was, oh so good at this. They never even noticed that she was the one who started things.

Ronni prowled the message boards like a bloodhound, watching for the perfect phrase. It had to come from someone else. And then, there it was. The thread wasn't even about Nick, it was about Howie...about how sweet he was. Big surprise there, thought Ronni. She'd met Howie, and he'd been sweet all right. And so sexy that Ronni had wanted to do things to him on the spot. She'd never met a man so unaware of the visceral response he provoked in women. She thought it would probably frighten him if he knew. Or maybe he did know, she reconsidered. Maybe he knew exactly what he was doing. Anyway, there was this poster blathering on about Howie and how he loved the fans and there was a reference to the same radio interview that had prompted the whole ‘pregnancy' scandal. Howie had said that maybe they lost some fans, but maybe they gained some new ones. There was a link.

Ronni clicked on the link, more to check the Howie facts than anything else. And there it was. Paydirt. Nick wanted to be the breadwinner. Ronni logged in as the Howie fan.

My man, Howie, is the sweetest guy on the planet. Like I'm telling you something you don't already know. LOL!! I really hate it when people paint him as not being very bright. He's really, really smart, you know, and he has a good head for business. Not like Nick! LOL!! I couldn't believe the dumb things he said in that interview.

Ronni sent it off and waited. She knew that there would be people out there combing through the interview trying to come up with the ‘dumb' things that Nick said. It wouldn't be too difficult. He'd made the comment about how the fans were the same, but older. She hoped someone else would come up with the other comment, but if not, she was prepared to take it on herself.

No one did. They mentioned the fan comment and that was it. It was a Howie thread. They weren't interested in Nick. Shit!

Ronni kept searching. She couldn't find any threads about Nick saying dumb things. Dammit! Then she rethought. Forget the dumb thing...go for the good thing. That was the path, she realized and went looking. She found a thread about Nick and Abby. It was an older thread and she had to bump it up to the front page with a meaningless comment from the AJ persona. Then she bounded in as the Nick fan and quoted an earlier poster who'd made some comment about how good they'd be together.

And isn't that just too cute, what he said about being the breadwinner? He's just so adorable.

Adorable? responded the Kevin fan. I don't think so. He's either naïve or brazen.

The Kevin fan went for a glass of wine at that point. When she came back, she watched the thread like a hawk, while logging on and off to post on other threads under her different names. Shit! Where the hell was everybody? At work? That gave Ronni a laugh. Half these posts came from people who logged on at work.

And then suddenly, there it was. What do you mean, naïve or brazen?

Ronni forced herself to wait ten minutes before she answered. She's an heiress. She's got way more money than he has.

Ronni then did the hardest thing she'd ever done. She shut down the computer and walked away from it. She went shopping and then met Clarice for a drink. She showed off her purchases, useless stuff that had caught her eye. She'd never wear half of it.

"Holy shit!" said Clarice when Ronni pulled out a pair of sheer Brazilian-cut panties and matching bra. "James is going to enjoy those!"

Ronni laughed. "You know it."

"Maybe I need to get something like this," mused Clarice, fingering the filmy material. "David just...well..." She gave her head a shake and then said in a Mae West voice. "It ain't like it used to be, Honey!"

"Blow him," said Ronni tersely.

"What?!" Clarice looked around to see if anyone could hear them. "Ronni!!"

Ronni laughed. Clarice had always been finicky about oral sex. She'd done it reluctantly before she got married and then stopped immediately after. "I'm telling you, Clarice, that's what they want. They've done all kinds of surveys and in every one, that comes out number one. Men want oral sex. They want women to suck their..."

"Okay, okay," said Clarice. She could feel her cheeks burning. "I suppose James gets it all the time," she said spitefully, trying to turn the tables on her friend. It was a mistake.

"You know it, Honey," said Ronni. "And he gives as good as he gets. ‘Cause I like a little..."

"Okay, okay," said Clarice. Omigod, was there nothing Ronni wouldn't talk about in public? Clarice hoped she didn't talk like this in front of her mother-in-law, but she wouldn't put it past her. Jeannette Fenton would have a coronary. Thoughts of Jeannette led to thoughts of Sharon Fremont and then on to Abigail. "I wonder if Nick Carter likes it," she mused.

"Yes, he does," said Ronni, without thinking. "I mean," she amended when Clarice looked at her bug-eyed, "they all do. I just told you that. They all do. It's a power thing, I think...you know, the little woman doing their bidding, worshiping their c..."

"Okay, okay," said Clarice for third time. "We're changing the subject right now, Ronni, or I'm leaving."

Ronni laughed. "Don't be such a tightass, Clarice. No one can hear us. All right..." Clarice had reached for her purse. "...I'll stop. But I'm telling you. You want good sex? Blow him."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Ronni changed into her new underwear when she got home. She pulled on a satin robe and went back to the computer. She clicked open the board. The thread was number one. There had been eighteen replies since Ronni's. She scrolled carefully through them. There had been a couple of ‘it's none of our business' posts, but mostly people were interested. There were lots of questions... heiress to what?...should we have heard of her? And then finally an answer...from someone in Chicago. It was about bloody time, thought Ronni. She was beginning to wonder if there were any fans in Chicago.

Her family owns Fremont Corporation. It's a big deal in Chicago. My dad works for it. Here's a link to the website.

Ronni clicked it open. It was a pretty boring website, but it gave all the basic information. It was a big company and whoever owned it was stinking rich.

Next came a comment from HowiesFirstLady, someone that Ronni hated with a passion. She was a holier-than-thou type, always coming across as knowing more than others. She loved to correct people. The bitch pointed out that Fremont Corporation was a publicly owned company, that it all depended how much stock was owned. And just because their name was still on it didn't mean they owned it.

Ronni guessed that she wasn't the only one who hated HowiesFirstLady because a snide response came back from someone that said the Fremonts owned 51% of the company. That made it theirs, no matter how you looked at it. And she gave the website link where the information was verified.

Ronni jumped in. Of course, even without the stock and all that, she has the trust fund.

Trust fund?

Ronni waited. Come on, come on, please let somebody else know something about this. Come on, Chicago fan, be someone in the know.

Ronni went to the bathroom. She admired herself in the mirror. Yes, James was going to like these. Maybe tonight she'd parade around in them, but not let him near her for a long time. That might be fun. She tried on a couple of different pairs of shoes. She settled on the stiletto heels she'd worn at Thanksgiving. She got herself a glass of wine from the fridge and went back to the computer.

Dammit! No one had any info on the trust fund, but they had lots of questions. Fine! She logged on as the AJ persona and said that she'd read somewhere that Abigail's grandfather had left her a trust fund that gave her the interest money until she got married and then the rest went to her husband.

No, no, protested the Kevin persona. You've got it wrong. He doesn't get the money. She does.

Oh, sorry, said the AJ girl, I guess I read it wrong. So you're saying she got the interest and now that she's married, she gets the whole thing?

While Ronni was logging off and coming back as the Kevin persona, someone else logged in and did her job for her. She quoted "He doesn't get the money. She does." and commented, Amounts to the same thing, doesn't it? Nicky has hit the jackpot!

And away we go! thought Ronni. She knew the Nick fans would come out swinging. And they did! First they were pissed that someone had called him Nicky. He doesn't like that any more, you know. Then they were upset that Nick was being accused of being after the girl's money. Ronni was tempted to log on and say that it certainly wasn't for her looks, but she figured that might blow up in her face. It was odd how no one ever commented on Abigail's looks. Maybe they were all as plain as Ducky.

Ronni watched it all without comment until she heard James come in the front door. Then she logged on as her rarely used Brian persona and threw poison all over what little facts were there. She announced that she had it on good authority that not only did Abby get the principal from the trust fund, but that Nick got the first million dollars of it. Sort of like a signing bonus, you know what I mean.

Then Ronni logged off and went out to see what sexual delights she could dream up for her and her husband tonight.