“So what’s the plan?” Elena asked, keeping her voice hushed, her hands still tightly holding onto Nick’s bicep as they stood in the hallway. 

Nick looked down at her, his face full of uncertainty, “I never said there was a plan.”

She couldn’t help but roll her eyes, “You sounded so assertive just now I figured you might have something in mind.”

A look of deep thought spread across his face for a moment before he shrugged, “Running was my plan.”

Elena’s frustration was cut short when Brian’s voice suddenly rang out though the house, calling Nick’s name. 

Taking action she reached up and grabbed Nick’s face in her hands, forcing him to look at her, “I need you to think fast,” she insisted, “Is there a fire escape? Can we go on the roof? You know this house; you must know another way out!”

Nick nodded and thought hard about what she was asking. The time he had spent in the house was not the best of times, usually he was stoned, or sleeping, but most times both. He had to sort through a lot of memories to think of the actual house and not the events that happened in it, “There’s a dumbwaiter!” he suddenly announced, still sure to keep his voice hushed. Nick grabbed Elena’s hand before she even had a chance to question his intentions, “I remember Patrick telling me this story when I first started coming here. This house is over a hundred years old, Victorian or something. There are fireplaces on each floor, so the builders put in a dumbwaiter to get firewood up from the cellar. I don’t know why I remember that, but it must have stuck in my mind for this very moment.”

They walked lightly across the hardwood floors, very aware that Brian was not far away looking for them and listening for signs of life. Luckily for them, apart from being old, the house was huge. Run down, but huge. There were quite a few winding hallways so if they were lucky they’d make it out unnoticed. 

They quickly reached a cut out in the wall and Nick pulled a latch open to reveal the tiny elevator.

Elena looked between the small space and Nick, “There’s no way you’ll fit in there!” she gasped.

“I’m not going in there, you are, without me,” he explained.

“If you’re going to start making plans at least let me in on them!” she requested while Nick helped her into the dumbwaiter.

“You’re going to go all the way down into the basement, there’s a door that leads outside, go right when you get to the sidewalk and run as fast as you can. I don’t know who is out there, whether Brian brought Howie and AJ so whatever you do don’t look back just run. Keep going and you’ll get to the marina, you should know how to get home from there, I imagine. Go home, and I’ll meet you there.”

“The police are there though,” Elena started to protest but they were both distracted by noise coming from the direction of the stairs.

“The police will be there waiting, I’ll find a way to lead him there. Good luck!” he told her. Nick was about to shut the door when Elena suddenly leaned up and kissed him. Not to change the subject or because she felt sorry for him but because she wanted to.

“Be careful,” she instructed as he shut the door, sending her on her way. 

As fast as he could Nick got away from the area, not wanting Brian to see where he’d come from and find out about their escape route. Just as he turned back into the main hallway he came face to face with his best friend turned enemy.

“Oh, there you are!” Brian grinned, and Nick knew that despite his casual demeanour he was angry. Brian had always told him that he couldn’t lie to save his life and now was his opportunity to find out whether he was right. 

“I thought I heard someone calling me,” Nick smiled back, approaching Brian slowly.

“Where is she?” Brian came right out, avoiding any other niceties. 

“Who?” he played dumb.

Brian laughed, shaking his head at Nick’s poor effort, “You think you can con me? I’ll ask you one more time, where is she?”

Unbeknownst to Brian, he was playing right along with Nick’s spur of the moment plans, “She’s gone. Man, what a bitch, she took off once we got here. I guess being around here was a bit too familiar. I got high and fell asleep.”

The moments after his first attempt at a lie were tense; Nick was worried that Brian would be able to see right through him and Elena would never get away.

“Why does that not surprise me?” Brian asked sarcastically, sighing, “Why did you take her in the first place?”

Nick tried not to let out a breath of relief but instead used Brian’s training to keep going, “I don’t know, I thought maybe if I used her as a pawn you would let me back in on everything. I didn’t think she’d be so conniving.”

“I haven’t heard anything on the news about her being found,” Brian commented, his voice laced with a touch of scepticism. 

“Maybe they’re keeping it quiet thinking that we might be out looking for her…like you are?” Nick suggested, making his way towards the stairs. He needed to keep moving and get away from Brian’s experienced eye. He was worried because he’d started to sweat along his hairline, stress consuming him as he tried to think on his feet – a quality he was not known for. 

Nick walked down the stairs quickly, afraid that Brian might kick him down the stairs. Despite the older man’s calm disposition Nick knew better, he’d seen him in action before. He knew Brian was mad, he knew that he was in serious trouble. 

“How about we go back to the house and discuss what we should do about this?” Brian suggested as he followed Nick down the stairs. 

“Why?” Nick asked, his guard dropping slightly. He had a feeling that Brian was a lot angrier than he had originally thought and he didn’t know what might happen if he went back to the house with him. 

Brian seemed to be losing a big of his edge, obviously stressed about his current situation beyond his normal amount of control, “Because Nick, you’ve really done it this time and I am not about to just let this go.”

“Maybe you should be out looking for the girl?” Nick offered, walking into the kitchen. 

“There’s something really fishy about this whole thing,” Brian said, approaching Nick. 

Howie yelling from the yard caught both of their attention and they listened as the other man yelled for Brian, completely out of breath. 

“What the fuck is going on?” Brian yelled out of frustration. 

Nick knew that Howie had seen Elena, and figured that AJ was probably still chasing her. Thinking fast he grabbed a pot out of the sink and hit Brian in the back of the head, watching the shorter man fall to the ground in a slump. Nick dropped the pot, wondering what he had to do next. He quickly ran to the front door and locked it to keep Howie out then picked up Brian’s limp form. He carried him out the side door, still listening to Howie trying to get in through the front. Brian’s car was only a few feet away, but so was Howie. As long as Howie stayed at the door, Nick figured he’d be able to at least get to the car and throw Brian in. 

He took the chance and ran out to the car, swinging the door open and getting Brian inside before Howie noticed him. 

“Nick!” Howie yelled, running towards the driveway as Nick ran around the car and into the driver’s seat.

He locked all of the doors just as Howie reached them then searched Brian’s pockets for the keys. He wasn’t distracted by the banging on the windows because he was on a mission, which was successful when he pulled out a key ring with the car keys dangling from the end. 

“You know Howie, I never liked you,” Nick said through the window as he started up the car. Howie got one good hit to the window in, cracking the glass but just as quickly Nick had pulled away. 

He wasn’t sure how far Elena had gotten on foot, but was confident that she was well on her way to her house. Just to be sure he used the time that Brian was unconscious to look for her, to make sure that he wouldn’t get to her place before she did. 

Nick pulled up to a stoplight, frustrated that he was stuck at a red when he was so close to the marina. He briefly glanced in the rear view mirror and did a double take when he realized that Howie was coming up behind him in his car with AJ in the passenger seat and he didn’t appear to be slowing down. The impact as the smaller car smashed into the back of Brian’s was intense and Nick lurched forward in his seat while Brian was knocked directly to the floor. Obviously when Howie had come up for the idea to try to run Nick off the road he hadn’t kept in mind that unconscious Brian might not be wearing his safety belt. 

Nick took off through the intersection against the red light (which was luckily free of traffic) with the Geo behind him hot on his tail. He had to trust that Elena had made it to her house. If AJ and Howie didn’t have her then she must be there. It was his time to shine; his perfect opportunity to prove that he was as capable as anyone else. Now all he had to do was get AJ and Howie to follow him to the Richardson’s mansion and from there figure out how he was going to clear himself from any involvement. 

He wanted them caught, but didn’t want to screw himself in the end. After all, he wasn’t ready to be sharing a cell with Carter Sr.