Prologue


"You cannot tell anybody what I am about to tell you. Not ever. Do you understand me?"

I nodded.

Nick Carter's hair was long enough to hang in his eyes, but not too long. His eyes peered through the strands that crossed his face and caught on the bridge of his nose. He stared into my eyes, his blue eyes were seriously intense. His lips parted, about to drop the bombshell of words that would alter everything I thought I knew about him.

In the silence that followed the words curling and twisting from his mouth, I felt as though I'd inhaled them. Toxic in my throat, my muscles clenched all the way down to my stomach and I felt sick. I stared up at him.

He pulled away, his face drawing back from my face. He straightened his suit as he straightened his spine, and he sniffed just a little bit, looked around, his jaw setting and said, in a level, purposeful voice, "I guess that's it, then. Good night." He walked away.

I stood there staring after him, at the wake of space that he cut through the crowd as he moved, the scent of him still hanging in the air. My hands shook. I turned and grabbed a passing glass of champagne, downing it quick so the bubbles would go straight to my head and take away my consciousness.

Since then, I have thought of a million things I could've said to him that night. Things that would've changed everything. But I didn't say any of them. Instead I got raging drunk.

It was the biggest mistake of my life.

Other than maybe when I took the job in the first place, of course.

Chapter One


Every time that I cleaned a room at the hotel, I opened the night stand and pulled out the Bible and fluttered through the pages. Not because I'm a devoutly religious person but because my brother, who is one, once said he tucks hundred dollar bills into the pages to reward housekeepers who are more interested in learning about Jesus than cleaning other peoples' filth off the floor. Personally, I'm just interested in finding the cash tools like Jake leave behind in the Bibles.

There wasn't any luck. Apparently whoever last occupied room number 3234 wasn't a Jesus Freak like Jacob was. I shoved the book back into the drawer and ran my Swiffer duster over the alarm clock and lamp base, stood up, and straightened out the bed duvet. Once I'd collected the bags of trash from the bins beside the desk and teeny-tiny fridge, I pushed the vacuum cleaner back out into the hallway, and spritzed the room with citrus air freshner.

Home sweet home for the next person who came lumbering through.

I looked at my to-do list. Next room to clean tonight was 4563. I think. The blonde imbicile downstairs at the desk had used a pencil instead of a pen to make my list and she'd smudged the last number so it could've been an 8. But I was fairly certain it was a 3. Or maybe a zero? No, a three. I pushed my cart along the hallway to the elevator, pressed the button with my palm and waited, staring up at the light indicating which floor the car was on.

The doors opened and a tall woman with curly brown hair stepped into the hallway, pulling along a suitcase. I watched as she pushed around my cart and slid the credit-card-looking room key into the door of the room I'd just finished cleaning. I shoved the cart onto the elevator as Room 3234 closed.

As I rode the elevator up to the next floor, I wondered - and not for the first time - how in Hell I'd ended up here, working as an overnight housekeeper. I mean there was a certain level of Desperate that must be reached by a girl to become a housekeeper overnight on the outskirts of Los Angeles. But in a recession like the one that the country was going through, I was just thankful I had a job that kept me from losing my parents' house and kept meals - even if they were meager - on my table. And at least the position of overnight housekeeper didn't include getting naked in front of perverted old men three times my age, like the job my friend Addison had taken.

Of course she had a lot more money than I did.

I adjusted the glasses on my nose and pushed my cart off the elevator as it dinged. The wheels squeaked on the new carpet that they'd just put in on the fourth floor.

The carpet is actually an interesting story. See, a couple months ago, this nutjob took his children hostage after the wife wouldn't let him take them to Disneyland. He holed up in the hotel under a fake name and had every cop in the city searching high and low for him like he was the most wanted man in America or something. He kept Tweeting pictures of the kids to prove they were okay. All he wanted, he said, was to see his children for a few days, and was that too much to ask? Well the cops thought so. Then he made the mistake of tweeting a photo that had the carpet in it, and I recognized it because, hell, I clean that damn carpet every day, don't I? So I took the picture in to my boss at the hotel and he called the cops and the cops came down and they had me knock on the door. "Housekeeping!" I'd shouted and he'd opened the door and the cops had blown the poor son of a bitch to smithereens.

I'd felt like I was in a TV show or something.

I'd kind of expected a good sized bonus check or a reward from the kids' ritzy, glitzy mother who lived in West Hollywood, but I guess there's no price you can put on a couple kids' lives because I never saw either.

So much for playing the hero paying off.

I pulled out my master key and slid it into the lock on room 4563 and pushed the door open, leaving my cart out in the hallway. I looked around. The beds were made, the room looked spotless. I called moments like this a free fifteen minute break. I pulled open the drawer of the nightstand, removed the Bible from inside, and rifled through the pages for a moment, then pulled out a cigarette from the pack I had tucked away in my apron. I opened up the bathroom door and stepped inside, and opened the bathroom window. Leaning out and staring up at the stars, I lit my cigarette.

I was probably about halfway through this blissful stolen smoke when I heard the room door open, followed by the thick, deep-throated laughter of a drunk woman. "Oh God, we're going to get caught with you parading around like that," she trilled.

"So let'em catch us," came a man's voice. "I don't give a damn..." he laughed, too.

"You don't now, but you will if Hugh ever finds out," she said in a warning tone. Her voice sounded vaguely familiar, though I couldn't place where from. For that matter, so did his.

"Hugh ain't gonna find out..." he muttered, though he didn't sound quite as tough after that. I heard the hotel room door close. "Now to get down to business. I've been thinking about this all week, you know..." his voice lowered to a purr.

She laughed and I heard a zipper. "Oh have you?"

"Every waking moment of the day," he answered.

I put out my cigarette, pressing the tip of it against the brick outer wall of the hotel and pulled the window shut. I wasn't entirely sure what I was hearing, but I was entirely sure that I should not be hearing it. I reached for the door about to pull it open and reveal myself when his voice, throaty, said, "Oh Christ."

"Hmm?" she hummed.

"Cora, you look -- you look amazing in that."

"This old thing?"

Cora. That's why I recognized her voice, I realized. Cora was the biggest powerhouse voice on the pop music charts in years. Everything that woman sang turned golden, like the Archilles Heel of music. It was insane the level of fame that woman had acheived in like two years' time. She had this signature throaty voice that sounded like something hot off a vinyl from the 1940s. And she had a body to boot. Everyone from the top down was trying to look and act like Cora. There were friggin YouTube videos about how to imitate her eyeshadow for crying outloud.

I have to admit as I stood there in the bathroom, poised to reveal myself, that I was starstruck. I couldn't move. Hell, I couldn't breathe.

"C'mere," the mystery also-familiar voce crooned.

I sat back onto the closed toilet lid, my palms on my knees. This mystery man was definitely not Cora's husband, Hugh Walters. Hugh was a new-money businessman, he owned a huge ass record label that had managed to buy out several of the major labels on the market since its inception a couple months after Cora's first album made him the richest man alive. He was an ex-football player, a linebacker, and looked the part with hands so big he probably could pick Cora up with one of them like King Kong at the end of the movie climbing up the Empire State Building.

This voice was so not Hugh's. It was low only because the speaker was being quiet, but had an almost nasally tone to it. This guy was definitely white, and - judging by the way Cora warned him he didn't want Hugh "finding out" - probably not built like a linebacker.

It was quiet. I heard shuffling, and then the bed groaned under their combined weight, and I realized what was happening here. I bit my fist to keep from uttering a colorful phrase. I was witnessing Cora Walters having an affair with -- well God only knows who, but I knew I knew the voice. Someone else famous. Probably someone else signed to Hugh's label.

Oh God.

My thought was mimicked in the other room. "Oh God," Cora moaned.

I grabbed my cigarettes out of my pocket and pushed the window open again. I didn't know if I could handle this. I lit up and puffed, making sure the smoke went out the window as they started in. Hums and moans echoed through the wall. I covered my ear with one hand and smooshed the other ear against my shoulder, continuing to smoke.

They went for quite awhile. And by the sounds of it they were really enjoying themselves. Like a lot. I closed my eyes and tried to block it out, but it was hard not to hear them. Especially once Cora got going. I mean she's known for provocative noises on her records... She even released a song entitled Oh My that was banned in like five countries because it was rated like a million Xes or something like that.

My palms were sweaty by the time they were finished.

Finally, it got quiet out there, and the light flipped on. A small crack of it eeked under the door. "That was fucking incredible," I heard the guy mumble. He sounded content, half asleep, happy.

"Yeah," Cora agreed.

The bed squeaked. "Where are you going?" the man asked, his voice worried.

"I gotta pee," Cora replied. I looked down. I was still sitting on the closed toilet seat lid. I looked around in a panic. I needed some place to hide. The damn shower stall door was clear. I looked at the sink, at the cupboard underneath it. Oh merciful Lord... I launched for it and pulled the doors open.

"Hurry," the man said, "I know we don't have a lotta time and I really just wanna hold you awhile..."

Cora's footsteps came closer to the bathroom door just as I slid under the sink and pulled the doors shut. My knees were pulled up close to my chest, and I tried to breathe as low as I could. "I really can't stay," Cora said as the bathroom door opened. "We've spent a lot more time than I should've already."

"Are you sure?"

"Hugh's going to wonder why I'm not home."

"Tell him the after party went long."

"He'll know better. It's bad enough I haven't been seen there in over an hour."

"I guess," the man sighed. "I just miss being able to spend time with you. Like I did on the tour."

"Oh you," Cora said, her voice husky. She laughed, and pushed her way into the bathroom.

I stayed so still I think I'd become stone.

I heard her close the door behind her and the light in the bathroom turned on, glowing around the cupboard doors. The toilet lid banged open and then she was peeing. Cora fucking Walters was taking a pee just a couple feet from me. I was equally disgusted and excited. Not like in a perverted way but just in the ohmygaw I'm so close to Cora Walters right now way. I mean I'd be really pleased if she was doing something besides fucking a mystery man and taking a pee.

Suddenly the man's voice came through the door. "When can I see you again?" he called.

"I don't know. I'll text you."

"It's just really hard," he said. "I like knowing when I'm gonna see you next... It gives me something to look forward to..."

"It's impossible to plan around Hugh," she said, "You just never know when he's gonna up and fly off to Italy or Paris or Japan."

The man was quiet. Cora got up and I heard the toilet flush. She stood in front of the cupboards, her shadow darkened the cracks of light. She turned on the faucet and the water rushed through the piping that I was contorted around. I heard her wash her hands.

The door opened. "Don't look at me like that," Cora said in a tired tone.

"Please. Just... a timeframe at least. A week? A month?"

"I don't know."

"When are you going to tell him?" he asked, "When are we going to be together? Like for good? You still want that don't you?"

The water turned off. It gurgled its way down the drain. I held my breath. I could hear the desire in his voice. Jesus, what would it be like to be wanted by a man that much? I wondered... wanted so badly that the words rolled off the tip of this guy's tongue like a child's pleading. I'd never been that wanted before - by anybody in my entire life.

"Of course I do," Cora replied, and I heard her turn, heard the door open more so that this mystery man could come in, heard their flesh touch and his arms swish around her, their shadows moving across the cracks of light that was my limited view. My heart raced. I closed my eyes, I imagined this man's arms around me, imagined the passion that was bound in the energy between them. "I want it more than anthing. But we have to do this the right way, or else we're both going to lose our record deals... and you know that as well as I do."

"I know..." he muttered, his voice muffled - probably against her neck.

"It's time to say good night," she said thickly.

"It's always time to say good night," he mumbled, but I heard him take a step back, heard their bodies part.

They left the bathroom and the door closed. I stayed still. I couldn't make out any of the rest of the words they said, only heard the muffled tones. I didn't move from my hidey hole under the sink until I heard the hotel room door close with a heavy thump. I rolled out onto the tiled floor and stood up, reached for the lightswitch with a shaking hand. I pushed open the door to the bathroom and looked around the room.

One of the beds was messed up, the blankets were completely off it. I didn't even wanna think what an infraed light would pick up for body fluid on there. I shuddered to think of it and reached for the corner of the sheet and dismantled it from the bed, tossing it in the corner in a ball. Just as the sheets hit the floor, I noticed something on the carpet under it. I kicked them and found a wallet.

I picked it up and flipped it open.

"Holy shit," I muttered, staring down at it.

Nick Carter.

Chapter Two


I was just backing out into the hallway after finishing cleaning up room 4563 when the elevator doors dinged open. I glanced down the span of new carpet and there he was -- Nick Carter, in the flesh. Now I'm gonna be honest, I was a pretty big Backstreet Boys fan 'back in the day', but I lost track of them sometime after Kevin quit the band back in 2004. It wasn't that I didn't like them anymore, it just became harder to keep up with them after that, and to be honest I didn't have a lot of time. My parents had died around that time and between my brother, Jake, turning douche bag and the stint I did in therapy I just never quite caught back up. The Nick Carter that I remembered, therefore, was kinda frumpy and overweight -- the Nick Carter that was so obviously coked up that it was embarassing at times. But the Nick Carter that came walking down that hallway --- well, this was an entirely different breed altogether.

I think my heart stopped.

"Hey," he said, looking at the room door, "Are you about to clean in here?" he asked. "I was here about - maybe forty-five minutes ago... I think I left my wallet." He held up his room key.

I couldn't answer, my throat felt constricted. I just moved aside and he pushed the door opened and went inside. I followed him. I opened my mouth to tell him that I had his wallet, but no sound came out.

"Jesus," he said, looking around the room, "You cleaned up quick..." He looked at the freshly made bed, then bent down and looked under it. His ass stuck up in the air and if I'd been close to regaining my composure I quickly lost it. He glanced over at me. "You speak English or what?" he asked.

I nodded.

"What are you, like Swedish or something?" he asked.

"What?" I asked. The question was so... left-field that I was stunned into answering. My voice croaked out of my throat like I hadn't talked in a couple centuries.

"You -- are you Swedish or something? You got blonde hair." He waved his hands at his shoulders to indicate my hair. I reached up and touched it.

"No... I'm -- You have blonde hair too," I stammered.

"Sorry," he said, "I don't mean to offend you or sound like racist or nothin'..." he paused, standing upright, and looked around the room. "I gotta have left it here somewhere... I had it... in my pocket..." Nick came toward me and stood in the door way and started moving through the motions that he and Cora had evidently taken when they'd come in the room. He waved his hands at his pants then in a motion like he was tossing them into the corner I'd found the wallet in. He stared at the carpet, as though expecting it to materialize there. "Hmm..." he furrowed his brow.

I reached into my apron and touched the wallet. Wrapped my fingers around it. I was about to pull it out of my pocket when Nick did a couple tight circles, then ducked across the room. "Cora went in the bathoom..." he muttered and pulled open the door and stepped into the bathroom.

I used the opportunity. I took the wallet out of my pocket, put it on the floor behind the desk and, still bending down from putting it there, I said, "I found it."

Nick came back out of the bathroom, a relieved look on his face. "Oh thank God," he said. He rushed over, hands extended and I stood up, and dropped it into his palms. "I ain't freaked out like that in a long time... she would've killed me if --" he paused and studied me. "So yeah, thanks."

"You're welcome," I said. I stood still as he shoved the wallet into his pocket, then headed for the door.

"Tell Cora hello for me," I said.

I heard him stop short in the doorway. He turned back. "How did you know --"

"You said her name," I replied.

He backed up, squinted at me. "When?"

"Just now. You said Cora went in the bathroom."

Nick's eyes were narrow.

"Does Hugh know?" I asked conversationally.

Nick's eyes narrowed even further.

"How long have you two been having an affair?" I asked.

"We haven't, we were talking business," Nick lied. "We're thinking about having Cora out on the next Backstreet Boys single."

"There was a used condom in the trash," I said. Nick face looked like a little kid confronted with the news that mommy found the lid off the cookie jar and he stood there helplessly before me. "Besides, why would you go to a hotel all the way across town from the after party Cora's supposedly at tonight?" I asked. I rubbed my chin, "A VIP booth at the club would've been just as effective as checking into a hotel for an hour... No, no I don't think you were doing any kind of business in here..." I shook my head. "There's a few tabloids I'm sure that would be fasssscinated by this information," I said in a hum-ho tone.

I couldn't believe that I was in the process of blackmailing a Backstreet Boy.

He pulled his wallet back out and opened it hastily. "How much?" he said.

"Hm?"

"How much to keep your mouth shut, Sherlock?" he asked, pulling out about seven hundred dollar bills.

I shrugged.

Nick looked paniced. "Please," he said, "Please. I - I really love her, I don't wanna fuck this up." He held out the bills. "This is all I have in cash," he said. "Please. Please don't tell anyone about this."

I studied the bills. I reached out, took them, folded them neatly, shoved them in my bra and said, in as casual a tone as I could muster, "About what?"

Relief panned across his face. "Thank you," he said.

He started for the door again.

"It was nice meeting you, Mr. Carter."

He lingered in the doorway a moment. "It was expensive meeting you, miss.....?"

"Samantha," I said, "Samantha Roades."

"Miss. Roades," he finished. He paused. "Well... I'll give ya a call if I ever need a crime scene analyzed 'cos, damn, you're practically Adrian Monk." And just like that, he ducked out of the room.

I reached into my bra and pulled the money he'd just given me out. I fanned the bills out in my hands. Seven hundred dollars. Just like that. "Stupid," I whispered, "I should've asked for more."

Chapter Three


"You had Nick-fucking-Carter alone in a hotel room and you didn't hump that?!?"

"Shhhh," I hissed.

Addison, my best friend, shook her head and waved her spoon at me, "I'm not even sure I can still associate myself with you anymore, you pass by an opportunity like that. For crying outloud, do you have hormones? Maybe we should get you tested."

"What was I supposed to do? Throw the guy on the bed and ravage him?"

"Savagely, yes. Maybe even with handcuffs." Addison licked her lips, grinning at me as she slipped a spoonful of strawberry ice cream into her mouth.

I scraped a bit of pistachio into my spoon. "Besides," I said, as though Addison hadn't suggested a thing, "He was fresh off a quickie. Imagine being rich enough that you use a place as ritzy as that as a pay-by-the-hour?" I shook my head.

"So tell me again how this all happened?" Addison requested, leaning in.

"I told you, I was just cleaning the room and I heard them come in and they had wild monkey sex and left. That's all there is to it."

"And then he paid you seven hundred dollars not to tell anyone."

I nodded, "Pretty much," I replied, licking my spoon clean.

Addison shook her head, "You are the luckiest bitch in the world."

"It's not like it was me he slept with," I said.

"Touche," Addison said, nodding. "That is the luckiest bitch in the world." She thoughtfully ate some of her ice cream, shaking her head as she stared at a spot on the ceiling somewhere over my head. "Damn," she muttered, "I just can't imagine it. Did he sound --- you know... good?"

"She seemed to be enjoying it," I said, shrugging.

"Well of course she did," Addison said, "She's Cora. The girl could have a convincing orgasm with a Q-tip." She shook her head. I motioned for her to quiet down (I mean, I'd been paid seven hundred dollars to keep it a secret, maybe telling the loudest girl in the city about it while we were in public wasn't the best idea). Addison lowered her voice and leaned forward, stabbing her ice cream with the hot pink plastic spoon. "Could you like -- you know, hear him? Did he sound - you know...? How was his stamina?"

"They were at it awhile. I was starting to get claustrophobic in the bathroom," I said."

"Like... ten... fifteen minutes?" she suggested.

"More like twenty...thirty," I corrected.

"Jeeee-sus." Addison leaned back. "Did she sound... winded?"

"Addie."

"WHAT! I want to know! I need to live vicariously through Cora through you," she said. "Is that too much to ask?!"

My phone vibrated in my pocket and I pulled it out, glanced at the ID, and said, "Hold on a sec, it's work." Addison pulled the spoon back out of her ice cream and started eating again as I answered the phone. "Hello, Samantha speaking."

"Samantha, it's me -- Jobe from work." I recognized the front desk manager's voice.

"Hey Jobe," I said. "What's up?"

"I need you to come in so I can speak with you about a guest comment that was logged last night. If it would be possible, could you stop by the hotel sometime before three this afternoon?"

I literally had all I could do not to choke. Addison looked up and made a concerned face. "Before three?" I squeaked. I pictured Nick stopping by the desk on his way out and complaining that some psychotic bitch housekeeper had blackmailed him. I pictured him seeking revenge. "I'll be there..."

When I'd hung up, Addison raised an eyebrow, "What's wrong?" she asked.

"That was Jobe. He said he needs to talk to me about a guest comment from last night."

Addison's second eyebrow joined the first for a look of surprise. "Carter?" she asked.

"I'm afraid it might be," I answered. I pushed my dish of ice cream away and stood up, pulling out my wallet. "I gotta go, either way... I gotta get down there... the sooner the better... I just hope he doesn't fire me..."

Addison waved away my wallet, "I got this. You go."

"You sure?" I asked.

Addie laughed, "Sam, please. I know you can't afford this."

"I just got paid seven hundred dollars to not tell the world about you-know-who and you-know-who," I reminded her.

"And you've been living off Ramen for the last three weeks. Go buy real food." She pulled out her own wallet. "After finding out what the blonde sex god commented about you." She tossed a ten onto the table and got up. "If it's negative, let me know, we'll go castrate him."

I laughed. "Thanks Addie."

"Not a problem." She hugged me and I turned to leave. I was almost out the door when she shouted, "I still can't believe you didn't hump him!" Several parental units glowered at her. One mother even covered his child's ears. Addison waved to her, and the woman looked even more affronted.

"Bye Addie," I called, and I ducked out the door.


---


When I arrived at the hotel, the blonde imbecile that'd been working the desk (and smudging up my list of rooms to clean) the night before was on again. She smiled benignly and sent me out back to Jobe's office. I knocked meekly and he called me in, waved me into a seat, and said, in a booming voice, "So do you actually know Nick Carter or did you just meet him last night?"

Damn, it was about him, I thought to myself. I wondered how much trouble I was in right now, if I should be freaking out or what. My throat felt tight. "I just met him last night," I squeaked.

Jobe looked surprised. He looked down at a comment card on his desk. "Well something you said must've impressed the guy."

"Why's that?" I asked.

Jobe tossed the card across the desk so that it landed on my side. I picked it up.

Nick's handwriting was scratch at the best. It looked like a child had written it: Samantha Roades was very helpful. If you could give her my number, that'd be great. Tell her I may need her Monking services in the future. The words were followed by ten digits.

I looked up at Jobe.

"I may not want to know the answer to this, and if I don't want to know it, please for the love of God lie, but --" he cleared his throat, "What in God's earth does he mean by Monking services?"

"Like Monk... the TV show. He thought I was observant..." I shrugged.

Jobe rubbed his chin.

I swallowed. "Am I ...in trouble?"

"If Monking services isn't code for prostitution then not at all," Jobe replied. "Quite the opposite. It's actually one of the best comment cards I've received for a housekeeper." He paused, "You do know that if it is, it cannot be allowed, right?"

I nodded.

"So long as we're on the same page with that, then we should be good," he said.

I held the card out for him to take back, but he waved his hand, "He wanted you to have the phone number, remember?" he asked.

"Yeah."

"Thanks for coming in," he said, and he stood up and held out his hand. "You have a great night, Samantha."

But even as I shook his hand and told him to have a good night right back, my mind was already spinning about what in the world Nick could've come up with in the time it took him to ride the elevator to the lobby that would make him leave a calling card requesting my services...

I already knew exactly what Addison was gonna have to say on the subject.

Chapter Four


After leaving the meeting with Jobe, I kept the comment card in my hand and kept looking at it. I drove to the grocery store like Addison had demanded and bought some real food and headed home to cook it, the card still clutched in my fist even as I brought in the bags and dropped them on the kitchen floor.

The house my parents had owned wasn't anything amazing. It was just a little brown thing. It kind of looked out of place with the large brick apartment building outback and the stripmall next door, but it was home and it'd been where we'd lived all my life. Which is why I was so reluctant to let it go, even though my brother, Jake, had moved out and stopped helping pay the rent. Now the entire $1,500 a month mortgage was all mine. Plus upkeep, which I wasn't doing so well on. And Jake, even though he was making a ton of money, was so keen on me not keeping the place that he wouldn't help at all.

Consequently everything inside was exactly like my parents had left it - their furniture, their carpet, their knick-knacks. The only thing different was I'd sold my dad's television set and in it's place was my stereo, which, although I probably could've sold for a couple pretty pennies, I refused to let go of. It was basically the alter of my worship, so how could I even dream of selling it?

Speaking of my alter of worship, I put on a Journey CD and went back to the kitchen.

Propping up the comment card on the table, I set to work making my Shake'n Bake Chicken dinner with broccoli and cranberry juice. I kept glancing over at the card. While I was waiting for the chicken to bake, I lowered myself into the chair and picked it up, studying the messy handwriting. I liked the way his letters looped and tilted and I wondered what his handwriting said about him, so I got up and got my laptop and pulled up a Google search on handwriting analysis.

A quick look through the words he'd written and looking at an article on the web revealed that (because it slanted to the left with wide descenders and open counters) he was a very creative, social person, who put a lot of pressure on himself, was very self critical, secretive, and had an authoritative nature. I leaned back in my chair and stared at the card.

The timer went off on the stove, so I got up and got my food and carried the plate, and the card, out to the living room where Journey was just wrapping up the end of the album. I sat on the floor in front of the couch and picked at my chicken while Steve Perry's voice faded out and silence regained control of the house. When I'd finished my dinner and wiped my fingers on a napkin, I took a deep breath and pulled out my phone.

My original intention was to call Addison to tell her I'd had a real meal and ask her if she wanted to hang out, but somehow as I was staring at the comment card, my fingers moved naturally along in the order of the digits of Nick's phone number. And I didn't even realize what I'd done until the phone was answered and instead of Addison's voice, a deep, throaty, man-voice filled my ear.

"'lo?"

At first I thought it was Addison's client of the night but when I pulled the phone from my ear and looked at the number I'd dialed I realized what I'd done and words escaped me.

"....hello?" he said, his voice a little clearer this time. "Hello?"

"Nick Carter," I pushed the words out of my mouth. "Hi."

"Hey," he paused. "Samantha, right? Samatha Roades?"

"Yes. Yeah. Hi." I sounded like a blundering idiot, I realized. I smacked my hand against my face, thankful he couldn't see the fact that I was turning redder than a tomato. I needed to regain composure. This was the only way I was gonna be able to talk to the guy. I mean, that's how I'd managed to blackmail him after all. I just needed to collect myself. I stared down at the carpet.

"You got the comment card I left," he said. He seemed oblivious to the fact that I was stammering and struggling to get words out.

I took a deep breath. "Well my boss was a little confused what you might've meant by Monking services and brought me in to remind me that prostitution isn't accetpable."

Nick choked on something. "Oh shit," he laughed, and I heard him put the phone down a second (I imagined him having spit food all down the front of himself or something and having to wipe it off), "I didn't even think of that when I wrote it." He laughed, "You aren't in trouble, are you? Do I gotta call him up and be like yo that's not what I meant?"

"No, I told him that wasn't what you meant. Luckily for you, Jobe likes me so he took my word for it..." I paused. "What did you mean, consequently?"

Nick's voice deepened, "Well, I have a proposition for you."

"A proposition?"

"Mmmhm."

"What kind of proposition?" I asked.

I heard him lick his lips. "I don't exactly wanna get into it over the phone. Can I take you to dinner and tell you over a meal?"

I looked at my freshly empty plate. "Sure." I mean at worst I ended up with a free doggy bag to eat later or tomorrow, right?

"What's your address, I'll send a car to pick you up." He'll send a car to pick me up. The words echoed in my head. This was very James Bond-esque. I hesitated, then decided what the hell and gave him my address. "Okay," he said, "Lemme call my driver and he'll be there in about an hour or so. What kinda food do you like?"

"I'm not picky," I answered.

"You sure?"

"Yeah," I answered, "I'll eat anything."

Nick laughed, "Okay. I'll find something. See you soon." He hung up the phone.

I stared at my phone for a second until the call ended screen blinked away. It felt surreal. I shook my head in an attempt to rejoin reality. I put the phone down on the table. "Did I just make a date with Nick Carter?" I wondered outloud.

Then it hit me.

"Fuck, I just made a date with Nick Carter!" I leaped to my feet. "Oh fuck, fuck, fuck." I ran for the bedroom and yanked my closet door open. Nothing. Nada. Zero. Zip. I ran back to the living room, grabbed my cell phone and dialed Addison's number. For real this time. "NINE ONE ONE, NINE ONE ONE!" I shouted the moment she'd answered the phone.

"What? What's wrong?"

"I just made a date with Nick Carter and I don't have anything presentable to wear!"

"We'll go shopping!" she declared. "Are you free tomorrow?"

"It's tonight!" I cried.

"The date is?"

"YES!"

"Shit! How long do you have?"

"His driver's gonna be here in an hour!" I squeaked. "I don't know how this happened!"

There was a considerable amount of noise on Addison's end of the phone. "I'm looking in my closet now for something. Is this like a date-date?"

"I don't know. He said he has a proposition for me..."

"A PROPOSITION?!" Addison cried. The way she said it, it sounded dirty.

"I don't think it's like that," I said and I told her about the comment card, about the Monk reference, and how I'd just eaten but I was going to go out to dinner anyways.

"Ok I have something," Addison said. "It's perfect. Now go do your hair. Loose curls. Pale pink make up. I'll be there in about fifteen minutes. GO!"

"Going!" I hung up the phone, thankful for Addison and her extensive wardrobe and the fact that we both had the same waist size, and I ran for the bathroom to turn on my curling iron, my heart pounding.

Chapter Five


"Are you sure it's not too short?" I asked, pulling on the end of the white boho-peasant style dress Addison had showed up with. She'd pulled a wide brown leather belt around my middle and stuck me in some sandals. I had a flower in my hair. The only thing keeping me from looking like a classic sixtys flower child was the thick rims of my glasses that slid down my nose. I pushed them back up. "I feel like my ass is showing. Is my ass showing?"

"It's perfect," Addison replied. "Your ass isn't showing." She took a picture with her cellphone. "You look like a goddess. Or an angel. Something. He's gonna proposition your brains out." She grinned.

I blushed. "I told you, it's not like that."

"Honey when a man goes out of his way to get you to call, sends a car, and brings you out to eat because he has a proposition for you, it's never not like that."

I shrugged. I took Addison's cell phone and stared at the picture she'd taken. "He said he loves Cora," I told her.

"Men say they love a lot of things," Addison replied, "What they really love is sex." She took her phone back. "Do you need like technique tips?" she asked.

It'd been awhile for me, but I was way too embarassed to agree to that so I said a strongly emphasized no and pushed my glasses back up my nose. "Well if you change your mind, you can text me anytime," she said. "I have a karma sutra phone app."

"Do they seriously make one of those?"

"Of course they do," Addison said, like I was crazy to even wonder that.

The door bell rang.

"Oh God! Addie!" I squeaked.

"Relax. You look stunning. He's gonna forget Cora's name the second he sees you."

I looked at her with wide, pleading eyes.

"What?" she asked.

"What do I say? How do I act?"

The door bell rang again.

"Just be you!" Addison said, "Forget who he is, he's just a guy, you know? I know he's a hugely beautiful guy, but at the end of the day he still pulls down his pants to shit, you know? He's just a guy! So treat him like a guy!"

I nodded. "Okay," I said. I hesitated. "You know I'm bad with guys!"

"SAM!" Addison cried, "Just talk to him like you'd talk to me! Like you'd talk to anyone."

"Okay."

The bell again.

"Hurry, the driver's gonna think he's got the wrong address," she said, shooshing me toward the door and shoving my purse into my hands. "Take pictures! Discreetly, of course! And I wanna know how big he is. You know what I mean, of course."

I wasn't sure I did.

I opened the door and there stood a chauffer like something out of an Audrey Hepburn movie and my heart almost stopped. "Good evening, Miss. Roades," he greeted me.

"Hey.... Stanley," I said, looking at his name badge on his chest.

He smiled and waved to the sleek black car that sat on the curb out front. "Mr. Carter's asked me to bring you down to the piers. He wished for me to ask if you like seafood?"

"I told him I like everything," I said. I took one last glance back at Addison, who was holding up her hands as a mock camera, and closed the door behind me. I followed Stanley across the yard to the curb and he opened the backseat door. I slid in and he closed it behind me before going to the front driver's door. I leaned into the leather seat cushion and looked around. Honestly, I'd expected Nick to be in the car, too, but he wasn't.

The dark tinted window that separated myself from Stanley rolled down. "Is everythin comfortable to your liking, miss? The air? Music?"

"I'm good," I replied. The window started to roll back up. "Wait," I said before it closed. He lowered it again, "Can you keep the window down? It's lonely back here."

"Yes m'am." I saw Stanley smile in the reflection of the rearview mirror and he started the car. We moved through Los Angeles traffic smoothly, and Stanley kept his eyes on the road.

I looked around for quite awhile, but as the sun went down the windows were tinted so dark it was harder and harder to see out them. We'd gone quite a way from the city by the time I turned to focus my attention to the interior of the car. The leather interior of the car was nice, but obviously not brand spanking new. There was a pen mark on one of the seats and I licked my thumb and started working on rubbing the ink off. "So how long have you worked for Nick?" I asked Stanley as my skin squeaked against the leather.

"About two years," Stanley answered. "Since he was signed to Hugh Walters Records. I actually work for Mr. Walters. I'm one of thirty drivers on call for Mr. Walters and his recording artists."

"Swag," I said.

"Yes, I am swag," Stanley replied, smirking. He reminded me of someone - some actor. One of those guys that are in like everything but whose names you never really know. I decided I liked him.

"What's this pen mark from back here?" I asked.

"Only God knows," Stanley answered. "I've learned not to ask questions about what goes on back there when the window's closed." He smiled.

"I can imagine," I muttered, and I stopped trying to rub the ink off the cushion, and instead started wondering what had gone on back here. I wasn't sure it was a good thing to think about it too much as I was sitting there. I decided to change the subject. "In your experience, is Nick a good guy?" I asked.

"Yes," Stanley said. "A little misguided perhaps, but a good guy none the less." I wondered if he knew about Nick and Cora. I didn't dare to ask because of the seven hundred dollars and all. "Here we are," Stanley said.

I reached for the button to unroll my back window and it slid down as Stanley pulled up to a restaurant which had a flat face from the back but the smell of the ocean surrounded it so that I thought for sure the otherside must certainly be the endless view of ocean. Stanley parked and I rolled up the window again as he came around. When he opened the door, he offered out his hand to help me climb from the interior of the car like I was in a movie or something. I stared up at the restaurant. The sound of people laughing wafted through the ocean air. The breeze caught my hair a little bit and Stanley reached up and tucked a stray strand behind my ear. He smiled. "Enjoy your evening, Miss. Roades."

"Thank you," I answered.

I turned to the restaurant and started walking toward the door, where two waiters were positioned, prepared to open the doors. I was unsure what to expect once I stepped through them and I glanced back, but Stanley was already getting into the sleek black car. I took out my phone and shot a quick text to Addison with a picture of the restaurant, and climbed the steps to the door.

"Good evening," said one of the waiters, and they pulled the doors opened in unison for me.

"Thanks," I mumbled.

The inside was dark, lit by glowing fireplaces and twinkle lights that shone like stars across the ceiling. I looked around and located a waiter, and said, "I'm here to meet Nick Carter," as quietly as I could.

The waiter smiled, "Right this way," he said, and he led me through a maze of tables, past distinguished looking people in boating clothes all talking and laughing. He led me up a short flight of stairs to the roof top balcony and as we came out the door, the city of Los Angeles came into view across the bay, its bright lights creating a colorful, almost impressionistic reflection on the water. The entire deck was surrounded by rose bushes.

"This is beautiful," I muttered.

The waiter led me through the tables to a booth in a corner of the deck and as we approached, Nick turned around in his seat, and he smiled, his lips spreading, pushing the muscles of his cheeks up and his eyes glowed. He stood up politely as the waiter brought me over and mumbled something about his party having arrived and Nick extended his hand with a tip for the waiter, who wandered off quickly, then he turned to me. "Thank you for coming," he said, and he waved me into the seat opposite of him, "I've been thinking about you since last night when we talked back at the hotel..."

Chapter Six


I don't know what was more breath taking. The view of Los Angeles across the water, sparkling like a million colored stars or Nick's eyes that were a shade of blue that can only be described by a word like azure or some other fancy word. Ultramarine, maybe. He smiled across the table at me and these adorable little lines appeared at the outer corners of his eye lids. I breathed deeply, inhaling the scent of salt and lobster and the waiter returned with a couple menus and a bottle of wine that Nick had apparently ordered. He popped the cork and poured the wine into two glasses on the table. Nick lifted his the moment it was finished being poured and raised it to me, taking a sip as the waiter poured mine.

When the waiter had gone, Nick leaned forward again, put his glass back down, and said, "I don't know how you figured out what was going on between me and Cora last night at the hotel, but you did, and I thought it was really impressive how you did it. With the little clues and stuff."

"Thanks," I said, and I picked up my glass. I wondered fleetingly whether I should tell him about my being in the bathroom the whole time or not. But before I could conclude whether it was a bad idea or not, he started speaking again.

"See, you're officially the only person other than me and Cora that knows about us," he said slowly, "And it's really important that stays that way..."

"Yeah," I said, "I know. It was seven hundred dollars in cash important." I nodded and took a sip of my wine. The taste was heavy and oaky and the alcohol fizzied right to my brain. I felt instantly drunk and put the glass back down, making a mental note that the wine was strong as hell and to drink it sparingly.

Nick nodded, "Yeah... But see, here's the thing... I really like Cora. A lot." He licked his lips and lowered his voice, "And she likes me, too, and we wanna be together, you know? But Hugh Walters is standing in our way and I'm not exactly built to fuck with Hugh Walters." He paused. "You know who Hugh Walters is, right?"

"Who doesn't?" I asked.

Nick nodded again, nervously this time. "Yeah. So you see why I don't wanna fuck with the guy... So here's the thing. If they break up... it's gotta be because of him, because of something he did to offend her. See? Then he can't black ball us in the industry, you know? I just got back to the top after fighting all these years for credibility, you know, I don't wanna get knocked back down..." He leaned back, looking like he'd just explained everything.

I stared at him. "Okay... What's that got to do with me, though?"

"Everything."

The waiter came back and I realized I hadn't even looked at the menu. "Sorry," I said, and I pulled the menu open and looked down at it.

"I'll have the smoked salmon with asparagus," Nick said, "And start me off with a cup of the red pepper soup." He glanced over at me.

"I'll have the same," I said, deciding that I didn't have time to read through every description on the menu. Nick was lounging back comfortably in the wooden chairs and looking out across the water now. He seemed to come here frequently, the way he was acting, so I just assumed he knew what would be best on the menu. The waiter smiled, nodded, and took our menus and swept away.

Nick was still staring off at the city. I cleared my throat and he looked back at me. "It's been less than twenty-four hours and I miss her already," he sighed. He shifted in his seat and picked up his wine glass again and swirled it around, staring down at the dark liquid, then drank the remainder of it. He reached for the bottle in a stand of ice beside us.

"What do I have to do with you and Cora and Hugh?" I asked, trying to reel him back in to the conversation we'd been having.

Nick poured his wine into his glass, closed the bottle again, took another sip, and said, "Like I said. Everything." He put the glass down. "You figured out in just a couple minutes what all was going on with me and Cora," he said. "I need you to figure out what Hugh is doing. Or who," he added.

"You think Hugh Walters is cheating on Cora?" I asked, raising my eyebrow. "Why would anyone cheat on a woman like that?"

Nick shrugged, "Because he's Hugh Walters and he can. The guy is power hungry. He doesn't even really love Cora. He wants her for the image. The most powerful pop artist in the world coupled with the most powerful record label owner?" Nick shook his house, "Unstoppable combination."

"I'm not sure how I'm gonna figure this out, I don't know Hugh or Cora or -- well, even you, really."

Nick licked his lips, "Well, see, that's the thing. I need to get you around Hugh so you can see if he's cheating on Cora so Cora's got a reason to leave him, and then she and I can be together..." He took a deep breath, "Soooo... I want to hire you. As a private investigator."

"A private investigator." I had all I could do not to laugh.

"Yes," Nick nodded.

"I'm not a P.I.," I said, smirking, "I'm a maid, at a hotel..."

"But I'm offering you a job," he said. His eyes connected with mine, and I could feel the seriousness of the words he was speaking. "I'll hire you as my personal assistant, and then you'll have the proximity you'll need - at parties and events and meetings and whatever - to see what Hugh Walters is up to, pick up on your little crazy person clues, and report back to me. And I'll tell Cora. Once she knows what's going on, she'll break it off with Hugh and then me and her can live happily ever after." He seemed quite pleased with this offer and he leaned back, "And you'll have the added bonus of a sizable paycheck increase..."

The magic words. They were spoken.

I hesitated, putting my hands on the edge of the table, feeling the texture of the table cloth. The ambiance of the deck filled my ears. Nick stared at me. "How... sizable...?" I asked.

Nick studied me.

"Fifty thousand dollars," he said.

I tried very hard to stay level. "Fifty thousand dollars," I said calmly. I picked up my wine glass and stared at the liquid, pretending not to be completely floored by this figure. "For how long?"

"However long it takes," Nick replied.

"What if she never breaks up with Hugh, what if you don't end up with her?" I asked.

"She will. I will," he answered confidently.

"But if not?"

He shrugged, "Fifty thousand should cover us through the end of the year. If you're still needed in December, we'll rework the figure and extend the contract accordingly." Nick looked eagerly at me, "What do you say?" he asked.

The waiter returned carrying two bowls of soup. He lowered first one, then the other and smiled, "Your red pepper soups," he said. "Would you like cheese on that?"

"Please," Nick answered, and we watched as the waiter used a grinder to shred cheese on top of our soups. Then he topped off the glasses of wine, and bowed away. Nick looked at me as I dipped my soup spoon into the bowl. He leaned forward again. "What do you say?" he asked, trying to get my attention on him instead of the soup.

I knew I should've waited, should've talked about it with Addison, should've thought it through more, should've asked for a contract, should've done about a hundred thousand things before I agreed.

But I had at least fifty thousand reasons not to wait.

Chapter Seven


After we'd eaten, Nick walked me down to the curb where Stanley was waiting by his sleek black car, the door to the back seat already opened wide. Nick stopped me just outside the door of the restaurant and turned me to face him. "I'll give you a call in the morning so we can work some stuff out," he suggested. "I have this idea - I wanna throw a party, get everyone all together, and then you can check Hugh out for yourself. It'll be the perfect occassion to introduce you to him. I'll just need some help organizing it and everything."

"Sounds good," I said, nodding.

Nick smiled, "Have a good night, Samantha," he said.

"Thank you, you too." I walked down the steps to the car and Stanley offered a hand to help me into the car. I ducked down and slid across the leather seats.

"Take care of her, Stan-the-Man," Nick called, pointing, "Precious cargo on board, sir." He winked and saluted, then turned and started walking down the street, his hands shoved into his suitcoat pockets.

I watched Nick as Stanley climbed back into the car and we started driving away and we passed Nick as he stopped at the valet booth and held up his tag. He waved as we went by, his fingers forming the peace sign. I turned to face the front as Stanley unrolled the window that divided us. "Still lonely back there, miss?" he asked.

"Terribly," I replied.

"How was your evening?" he asked conversationally.

"The salmon was great," I replied.

Stanley nodded. "Things looked like they went well with Mr. Carter," he commented. "Although I must say usually when I am asked to drop a young lady off at a restaurant I'm sent home without her at the end of the night," he confessed.

"It wasn't like that," I explained.

"No?"

"Just business," I replied. "In fact, I'm going to be working for Mr. Carter for awhile now."

"Are you?"

I nodded, "I'm his new personal assistant."

Stanley nodded. "That sounds like a full time job," he chuckled.

Looking back, I had no idea how much of a full time job it was. But I was pleased at that point. I had the promise of a contract worth fifty thousand dollars, which, a quick Google search told me, given the fact that I was contracted for a half of a year or less, was more than the average personal assistants' salary. Of course that wasn't really the actual job I was being paid to do, though, was it? And Lord only knows what private investigators make for a salary... that one I wasn't going to try looking up.

I sat back in my seat and hugged my purse to my chest.

"You said earlier that you technically work for Hugh Walters," I said to Stanley.

"That I do," Stanley replied. "On call for him or his artists. And of course the lovely Miss. Cora as well."

"Hugh a good boss?" I questioned.

Stanley smiled, "He certainly isn't the worst, ma'am."

We got home in what seemed like less time than it'd taken to get to the restaurant earlier. Stanley pulled up to the curb and opened the door for me and helped me out. "Thanks," I said. "You have a good night."

"You, too, miss," he replied, and he walked around the car and climbed back in. I watched from the curb until his headlights had disappeared at the end of the street, then turned back to the house just as the front door burst open and Addison came running across the driveway toward me, arms outstretched.

"TELL ME EVERYTHING!" she shrieked.

I grinned, "You aren't going to believe what happened." My voice went all shrill and squealy and I hugged her and we started jumping up and down like wild teenagers.

"Did you have sex?" she squealed.

"No! Better! I got a job!!"

"A job?" Addison looked at me like I had fifteen heads and stopped jumping up and down immediately. "What kind of job?"

I took a deep breath, "Well, he's going to pay me fifty thousand dollars to pretend to be his personal assistant and --"

"And actually be his sex slave?" Addison guessed, a tentatively excited look on her face, like if I said yes she'd start jumping up and down again. "Oh my God, is he Christian-fucking-Grey? Is he kinky? Does he like it rough? Is that what this meeting was about?"

"Noooo," I laughed, "No. Stop thinking dirty."

"I can't help it, my brain only has one channel," she joked. "So what is he actually paying you to do if you're only pretending to be his personal assistant?"

"He wants me to find out who Hugh Walters is sleeping with on the side so Cora will divorce him and be with him instead," I said proudly. "I'm basically his private investigator."

Addison's excited face drooped. "He's paying you fifty-K to fuck an old guy?"

"What? No! Addie --"

"You can't fuck that old guy, I mean back in the day he was probably a stud muffin but today --- I mean yeah he was in the NFL once upon a time, but now --" she shook her head.

"I'm not sleeping with Hugh Walters, relax!" I said. "He wants me to find out who Hugh is sleeping with already. He figures if Cora's cheating that Hugh must be playing around on the side, too. It shouldn't take much. And I get to keep the fifty grand whether I find anything or not, and the longest I can work on it is 'til December, when he says we'll work out a new contract if need be."

"Oh... I was gonna say there's no way you can be this close to Nick Carter and end up fucking some geezer like Hugh Walters," Addison laughed.

"Because that's the part of the situation that would've been morally wrong," I said.

"Seriously though, in celebanese, personal assistant is sooooo code for sex..." she grabbed my hand enthusiastically, "C'mon, I need you to tell me everything about what happened so I can help you decode this because I'm telling you, there is no way all he wants is your detective skills. He could've just hired an actual detective for that..." Addison pulled me into the house, babbling a mile a minute about her theories of what Nick Carter could possibly be up to.

Addison and I sat up on the couch for hours and hours talking about everything, sprawled across the cushions, desperately trying to carry on the conversation in mumbled tones until neither of us could fight away sleep any longer.

The more she had talked the more I began to wonder: was Nick Carter up to more than he was saying or was he legitimately just desperate for some help with his love life? I wasn't sure...

Chapter Eight


I woke up the next morning with my cell phone vibrating under my face, which was smashed into the sofa cushions. I peeled myself off the cushion, kicking Addison by accident, and wiped a small puddle of drool off the touch screen. "Watch it, you're kickin' me," Addison groaned and curled tighter into a ball.

"Next time I'll kick harder," I teased her. I looked down at the phone screen. It was Nick. "Oh Lord," I gasped, "It's him."

Addison perked. "Nick?"

"Yeah," I stammered, staring down at it, my heart rate increasing.

"Well answer it," she gasped, "He's your boss now! Or your master however you wanna look at it." Addison grinned.

I glared at her as I answered the phone. "Hello?" I said in what I hoped was a non-sleepy tone.

"I was about to give up," Nick laughed.

"Sorry," I said.

I hadn't even completely gotten the apology out though before Nick interrupted me, his voice climbing right over mine, "So I was thinking --" he said, "About the party idea. Lemme give you the address for the studio I'm working at today and you can come by and we'll hammer out some details so we can get this thing put together."

"Okay... Lemme get a pen..." I got up and went out to the kitchen, grabbed a pad of Post-its and a pen, and leaned against the counter. Addison came after me, leaning against the door frame, trying to peer over my shoulder. "I'm ready..." Nick gave me the address and I jotted it down.

"Oohhh," Addison hissed, "A rondezvous."

I waved her away. "Okay, when did you want me to get there?"

"As soon as possible," Nick said, "I'm really excited about this party and I think the sooner we get it in the works the better..." He paused. "And hey could you grab some coffee and bagels on your way? Maybe one of those big to go things Starbucks does now, you know? And make sure the bagels are whole grain..."

"Okay..." I wrote down his requests.

"Acutally you know what, you better make it two of the coffee things and at least ten bagels, I have a lot of crew here. I'll pay you back when you get here of course."

"Okay."

"Get yourself something too, of course," he added, like an after thought.

"Okay."

"See you soon, Sam," he said, and he hung up just like that.

I closed my phone and turned to Addison. "Well, I guess I have my first assignment as his personal assistant," I waved the Post-it at her.

Addison grinned. "Just wait. One of these days, he's gonna call you and request condoms and then you're gonna get there and he's gonna ravish you on the hood of his car."

"What? Why the hood of his car?" I laughed and shoved Addison out of my way, snapping my Post-it back from her hand.

Addison frolicked after me up the stairs, "Because I just think that would be terribly romantic."

"Being fucked on the hood of a car?" I asked, laughing.

"Don't you think so?"

"Not even a little bit."

Addison laughed, "I think it's one of the few remaining places I have left to be fucked. Maybe that's why."

"Toooo much informaaation," I sing-songed at her.

Addison grinned. "I'm sorry darling, that my fantasies gross you out."

"I just can't help but think of how uncomfortable it would be. Wouldn't your skin stick to the car?"

"Traction," Addison said with a shrug.

I snorted at the thought of it, but I couldn't tell if Addie was serious or not (that was one of the gifts she had, she could deliver humor with such a deadpan expression that you thought she might just be serious), so I let it go. Upstairs I grabbed jeans and an old concert tee and changed out of the dress Addison had lent me, and tossed my hair into a messy ponytail.

"Well," I said after a long moment, "Wish me luck?"

Addison smiled, "I'm incredibly jealous of you."

"Because I get to buy Nick Carter's coffee?" I asked.

She nodded, "That and you're gonna end up with something wonderful out of this. I can just tell. I can feel it, you know?" She smiled. "You deserve something wonderful." She leaned over and gave me a quick hug. "Now go get his bagels."

"Thanks, Addie," I said.

We went downstairs and Addison climbed onto her hot pink Vespa and waved as she clicked the helmet strap at her jawbone before driving off.

I got in my car and headed for the Starbucks nearest the address Nick had given me. When I got there it took a few minutes to get a parking space before I got out and headed inside. They didn't have ten multigrain bagels, so I bought all the ones they had and supplemented with three asiago cheese bagels. I juggled the two boxes of coffee, box of cups, bag of creamers and sugars and cream cheese and knives and the box of bagels all the way out to the car. It was a delicately balanced tower of breakfast items.

When I got to the studio, I called Nick. "Could you send someone out to help me carry this shit in?" I requested. It wasn't until that moment that I realized I'd forgotten to order myself something, and I cursed inwardly. I'd just grab a cup of the coffee from the boxes, I told myself. And a moment later one of Nick's 'crew' - a bodyguard the size of a semi truck - came out and took all the Starbucks boxes in one trip. I followed him in, lamely carrying my purse.

The studio was dark maroon and violet and smelled like incense. There were string lights and tapestries hanging everywhere, creating a cave-like feeling that was added to by the full blast of air conditioning that gave the place an almost icy feeling. Nick was lounging back in a heavily padded rolling desk chair, his feet up on the edge of a lit-up soundboard beside a skinny black guy with a backwards baseball cap and so many tattoos that he'd run out of canvas on his arms and had started on his neck and the sides of his face.

"Hey," Nick said, leaning forward. His feet dropped off the soundboard and he got up. He was wearing messy jeans and a wifebeater tank top. He crossed the room as the bodyguard looking guy dropped the food onto a low coffee table and sat down on a beat up leather sofa. "Thanks for stopping at the Starbucks," Nick said, grabbing a cup, "We were dying in here. Although I read this article about a week ago about how beer is actually better for the creative process than coffee is," he said, "Because it lowers your inhibitions and coffee just like tricks your receptive nerves into thinking your brain isn't tired." He grinned and popped the thing open on the coffee, pouring it into his cup.

The guy with the tattoos and cap turned around, "Maybe we should've got beer," he laughed, "Fuck this coffee crap."

Nick laughed and, without adding cream or sugar, took a sip of his coffee, "Cheers, my friend."

I sat down carefully next to the bodyguard guy and wondered where the rest of Nick's 'crew' was, as the only crew I saw was these guys. Surely he didn't want ten bagels for just the three of them? But even as I watched, the bodyguard guy opened the box of bagels and took out three and started smearing cream cheese on them.

"So you found the place okay?" Nick asked as he, too, grabbed a bagel and started smearing cream cheese on it.

"Yeah I found it all right."

"Good." He looked in the box. "Uhoh," he laughed, "They fucked up. They gave you cheese bagels." He looked over at the tattoos and hat guy, "Looks like you're stuck with asiago bagels, Z."

"Fuck," cussed Z. Nick laughed and tossed one at him. "Aw fuck that man."

Nick looked up at me, "Any chance you could bring these back and get the multigrain?"

"Well they ran out of multigrain... I mean, we ordered ten of them," I said. "I told them to give me the asiago ones to fill in the gap..."

"Oh." Nick made a face. "But -- we wanted all multigrain. Maybe another Starbucks has the other three multigrain bagels we need?"

The two guys looked up at me expectantly.

"Okay," I said.

"Thanks dollface," Nick said, grinning, "I really appreciate it."

"No problem."

I turned to head back down to the car to go on the chase for the three multigrain bagels.

"Oh and hey while you're out can you stop and get a package of guitar strings for me also?" Nick said, "Since you're heading out again anyways?" He stood up and grabbed a little baggie from the top of the soundboard. He handed it to me. It was an empty package. "These are the ones I want," he said.

"No problem," I replied, tucking it into my purse.

He grinned, "Make sure you get those ones, not asiago ones." He winked.

Chapter Nine


It turns out, Nick's guitar strings are quite elusive. By the time I found what seemed like the only shop in the city that carried them it was early afternoon and the three multigrain bagels were getting hard in the bag Starbucks had packed them in, just from sitting out in the sun in the car. I swore as I drove back to the studio, stuck in lunch-hour traffic, and finally getting back to the studio about three hours after I'd left the second time, strings and bagels clutched in my hands.

When I walked in, Nick was in the soundbooth singing, and Z looked up from the soundboard where he had an In & Out cup balanced. He picked it up and sucked whatever it was he was drinking up the straw, then turned back to look at Nick in the studio. The bodyguard guy, whose name I had yet to catch, grinned at me, "Took ya long enough," he muttered, then he leaned back in the chair like Nick had been doing earlier, and closed his eyes.

I put the bagels down on the table where there was a plethora of take out wrappers and the empty remains of the Starbucks boxes from that morning. I pulled out the guitar strings and put them on the soundboard. "These are hard to find," I commented.

"You can only get them at that one store downtown," Z said without even looking up.

"Would've been great if one of you could've mentioned that earlier," I snapped.

Z looked up, the brim of his hat was now sideways. He lowered a pair of sunglasses he'd put on at some point while I was gone and stared up at me. "Ohh hohooo," laughed the bodyguard looking guy and he grinned, "We got a live one here."

"What's going on?" Nick's voice came over the microphone all staticy. He leaned to look out the window of the sound booth, "Oh hey Sam, you came back, I was starting to wonder..." he laughed and took of the headphones he was wearing. He came out a door to my right a moment later.

"This one's feisty," the bodyguard guy chortled.

Nick grinned, "What'd you do now?" he asked. He picked up the guitar strings from the soundboard, "Excellent, you found them."

"Yeah after going to like every music supply store in the fucking city," I said. "Why didn't you tell me they were only available at one store?"

Nick looked abashed. "Sorry," he said, "I forgot."

"You forgot?" I said, "How do you forget that they only are sold at one store in the entire city?"

Nick shrugged, "I just... forgot." He turned to the coffee table and picked up a cup and a bag, "When we ordered from In & Out, I got you a strawberry shake and a chicken sandwich. I didn't know when you'd be back, and we got hungry, but I figured you'd be hungry, too..." He looked so adorable holding out the fast food bag and cup and he'd actually thought of me that it was hard to stay angry with him.

I took the bag and cup, "Thanks," I said.

He smiled. "I'm almost done here with this take, then I'll take you back to my place and show you my vision for the party," he suggested, "Is that okay? Maybe ten more minutes?"

"Sure," I answered.

"You can eat while I get this wrapped up." He smiled then turned back to Z and the bodyguard looking guy, "You guys ready to put the capstone on the magic?" he asked, eyes sparkling.

"Bring it," Z hooted.

Nick winked at me, then ducked back into the soundbooth, pulling the door shut and slipping his headphones back on over his head.

I sighed and took a sip of the melty strawberry shake. It'd been there for a few, you could tell because of the consistency of it, but it was good nonetheless. Better was the in-house entertainment. Nick was recording background vocals for a solo track, so he had the foreground vocals blasting in his ears apparently and all we heard was him harmonizing and it was really nice. He really has a beautiful voice and I found myself munching slowly on my chicken, watching the faces he made as he melted into the melody of the song.

He was hypnotizing.

When he'd finished, he took of the headset and Z gave him a thumbs-up sign. The bodyguard guy had fallen asleep in the chair and I was finished with my chicken. When Nick came out of the booth he talked to Z for a couple minutes using fancy industry terms I didn't understand and then he turned to me. "You ready?"

"I'm ready," I replied as I balled up my sandwich wrapper and scooped up all their wrappers and bags and cups and threw them in the trash real quick. Nick shook hands with Z and told him to tell Lawrence - which was the first time either of them had said the bodyguard looking guys' name in front of me - that he said bye when he woke up. Then Nick swept me down the stairs and out to the parking lot.

He had a white Escalade in the corner of the lot, which we climbed into. "I'll bring you back later to get your car," he commented as he swung himself into the driver's seat.

I buckled up.

The moment Nick turned the key in the ignition, his stereo screamed to life. It was Nirvana. In Utero, to be exact. Kurt Cobain was screaming his lungs out at full volume. Nick spun the volume knob. "Sorry," he said.

"I have that CD at home," I said.

Nick grinned. "Cobain was a fucking genius."

I nodded, "Agreed."

"You need to tell Cora that sometime. She thinks he was the biggest joke the music industry ever produced," he said.

"Joke? Please. The mere fact that there's kids that were born a decade after he died that still listen to him proves he had talent. And lots of it," I said. I shook my head, "Cora's brilliant, but I don't know if there will be kids worshipping her decades after she's gone. Right?"

Nick shrugged, "She's got staying power. She's like a modern day... I dunno, like Aretha. She's a classic."

"Are you seriously comparing Cora to Aretha Franklin?"

Nick laughed, "In staying power only," he said.

"Nawh, she's great and she's hip and she's relevant, but I think her stuff is dated the same way Britney Spears' stuff was dated, you know? She was huge then, but she's not a standard, by any means."

"Only 'cos she went psychotic," Nick replied.

I could tell I was stepping on his head-over-heels-in-love toes so I let it go and we road along in silence aside from the groaning of the tires. Nick wasn't the best driver in the world and suddenly not being distracted by the conversation that became so painfully obvious that I felt like I needed to grip onto the arm rest for my life. He was a speedy driver with knee-jerk movements and a reckless sort of spirit. The engine hummed as he picked up speed, doing almost ninety on the highway once we'd broken free of thick traffic.

He glanced over at one point and saw my whitened knuckles as I held on tight. He laughed. "You okay?"

"I'm just fine," I replied.

"You look scared," he commented, grinning over at me, glancing between me and the road.

I really, really wanted him to face the road and stop glancing back and forth.

"I wasn't aware you were trying out to drive for NASCAR," I commented.

Nick chuckled. But he did slow down, however reluctantly.

When he pulled off the freeway finally we were in West Hollywood, almost into Malibu, and he drove away through glamorous neighborhoods, past tall palm trees that swayed in the breeze from the ocean. Every driveway had two or three fancy cars and huge fountains and swimming pools. My entire house and the lot it sat upon could've sat in the shadow of some of these places, I thought, as we drove by.

Nick turned into a gated community and paused in front of the gate. Apparently there was some kind of sensor linked to the car because the gate swung open and allowed him to drive on in. If it was possible, things were even fancier on the inside of the gate than they'd been driving through the area leading up to it. The houses had lush bushes lining the front of the property giving them a certain level of privacy. Nick drove along, up and up a gradually sloping hill, until he turned left and the road curved around, going downward until we reached a small stretch of houses that lined a beach, the ocean panning off into the horizon beyond them. Nick pulled into the curling driveway of the very last one and came to a stop directly in front of the towering white and brick house.

Turning off the Escalade, Nick swung his door open and got out. Following suit, I pushed my door open too and climbed out, staring up at the house, the sound of the tide roaring filling my ears. "Christ," I muttered.

Nick grinned as he came around the nose of the Escalade and waved his hand at the monster house we stood in front of, "Welcome to the House of Carter...."

Chapter Ten


The house was insane. The only way to make it crazier would be to plate the thing in solid gold. He had a huge marble staircase the moment you walked in, and chandeliers and the walls were lined with Backstreet Boys memorbila like platinum singles and little shelves with awards encased in glass.

The living room was inset to the floor with this square of built in cushions for a couch, covered with enough throw pillows that a person could drown in them. A huge screen TV lined the wall with a surround sound system that he bragged had speakers hidden even in the cushions of the seats so that you could feel them in your very muscles when you watched a movie. "You should come by and watch Fast and the Furious sometime if you don't believe me," he said with a chuckle.

He led me through an ornate kitchen with granite counter tops, and a game room with actual arcade style games lining the walls, and out onto a back stone breeze way that opened wide with a series of french doors to a stone staircase, overlooking a span of lawn. The lawn seemed to stretch on and on and on right to the edge of the beach where a slice of pale white sand met the ocean tide. The lawn was perfectly landscaped, the stone leading away from the staircase cutting it symmetrically in half, with a somewhat narrow pool in the center. Statues of various sea creatures lined the length of the pool, and several lounge chairs dotted the pool's edge under large palm trees that provided shade. It was like something out of a Bora Bora resort catalogue.

I stared out at the pool and the ocean and the green of the backyard, and Nick took the stone steps we were standing on two at a time and stood in front of the pool. "So here's my vision for the party," he said, waving his arms, "Lights. Big search lights. Maybe in a couple different colors... and they're sending these big beams of color up into the sky... and... You know those arches made of balloons? One of those... in pale, almost metallic pearly white... You know the color I mean, don't you?" I nodded. "And those are stretched over the pool here at regular intervals. Maybe four or five of them. With Chinese lanterns strung around so that it gives this whole backyard almost a bubbly feeling... And we'll have champange. Lots of champagne..." he walked further down the length of the pool, and I followed, mainly because if he went much further I wouldn't be able to hear him, "And waiters will walk around with plates of finger foods and champagne refills... and loud music. Thumping music. It'll be piped in from huge speakers... Right there... and there... and there... and there..." Nick spun, pointing in the corners of the yard. He turned to me. "Do you see it?"

I did. And it had a price tag the size of the moon. I looked at him, "It's going to be expensive to set up what you're describing," I said.

Nick shrugged, "What better do I have to do?" he asked, smiling. "I think it'll be nice to have a good party like that." He shoved his hands into his jeans pockets and looked around, "Yeah... And Cora will like the balloons," he added, looking up overhead like he expected the balloons to be there already.

I stared up, too.

He shifted his attention suddenly, shaking his head as though to clear away the mental image of the balloons. "Maybe we'll put a little bridge-like stage over part of the pool, too," he suggested, waving his hand in a low arch. "Maybe some kind of performers could be on it. Like a dancer or a singer or something."

I nodded, "Okay."

"Maybe you should be taking notes?" he suggested, eyeing me. "This is important, you know."

"I know. I'm good." I tapped the side of my head. "I remember details, remember?"

Nick grinned, "That's why I hired you." He pointed at me, winked, then turned to look up at the house. He let out a sigh, "Ohhhhh," he hummed, shaking his head. "I know it's a lot," he said, "I know it's excessive. You must think I'm some kind of spoiled rich guy..." He paused, I think so I could deny the claim. When I didn't, he turned toward the ocean view, squinted against the sun, and said, "I bought this place for Cora and I, you know."

"You did?" I asked.

He nodded. "Yeah..." he turned a little bit and waved at the beach, "I used to live down that way, and this one day we were walking the beach and we came around that bend there and she saw it and she let out this shriek and said I want to live there someday, with you and I went out the next day and bought the place." He shoved his hands into his pockets. "For her."

I stared at his back, at the wrinkles in his t-shirt, and the way his hair fell across the back of his neck. "Does she know you bought it?" I asked him.

"Yeah," he said quietly. "But I don't think she realizes I bought it because of her, because of what she said." He looked down at his feet. "Sometimes, I feel like she can't even see me," he muttered.

Something about the way he'd gone from an attitude of absolute, complete confidence as he'd described his party vision to this quiet, mumbling person that stood before me now... something about that made me feel profoundly bad for him. "I can't imagine anyone in the world could not see you," I said.

Nick laughed a little, a sad laugh. "You'd be surprised," he said. He looked back at me and his eyes were the exact same color as the ocean behind him. "I mean sure everyone in the world sees me. They see Backstreet Boys me, they see the me that I project, that they think I am. The me they want me to be... the stubborn child star all grown up and struggling with what fame means now..." He took a deep breath, and a teeny tiny smile eeked onto his face, "But I dunno, there's a part of me that it seems like nobody sees, this part that I really... deeply... desperately want to be seen." He looked me right in the eyes. "You know what I mean?"

My mouth felt dry. I reached out and put my hand on the side of a stone dolphin to keep from toppling over. I nodded.

"I really want Cora to see me," he concluded, and he turned away and the trance that'd been caused by his gorgeous blue eyes was broken and I sucked in oxygen and regained my composure.

"What if she doesn't ever see you?" I asked.

Nick shook his head, staring out at the water, "She will. Cora's the one."

"If she hasn't seen you," I said, "How do you know that she's the one?"

Nick turned to look at me. "She'll come around. She'll see me. She'll leave him. This party will help." He paused, took a deep breath and turned back to face me. "So... what do you think?"

"About Cora seeing you?"

"No, about the party."

"It... sounds like a great party," I said.

Nick grinned, "Great. Lemme know if you need help organizing it or whatever. Let me get you my credit card..." and he jogged away toward the house.

I blinked. "You want me to organize this all by myself?" I called after him.... but Nick had already ducked through the french doors and into the house, leaving me alone in his backyard.

Chapter Eleven


That night I sat on the couch and started pulling together resources to make Nick's party vision come true, armed with a shiny blue Chase platinum card which had a limit so sky high he said he dared me to max it out. I was cross legged, my lap top perched on a pillow beside me, my stereo playing the first Cora album, Google-searching balloon vendors searching for one that offered pearly white balloon arches. I'd found metallic silver, plain white, egg white, off white, cream, and beige, but none that offered pearly white.

"They're probably only sold by one fucking vendor in the country and he probably forgotto tell me which one," I wailed in frustration, throwing myself backwards onto the couch cushions and pulling on my own hair. "Oh my God," I groaned. I felt like I'd been looking at party balloon vendors for all of my life.

My phone vibed on the coffee table. I looked over, half expecting it to be him asking why the party wasn't set up already. It was Addison. I reached for the phone. "Hey," I said.

"Hey!" she cried. "You sound tired?"

"Exhausted."

"Long first day with the god-man?"

"You wouldn't believe it," I muttered, barely able to believe it myself that the damn bagel hunt of 2013 was less than twelve hours ago. I closed my eyes and rubbed my forehead, "He's got me planning a party."

"Planning a party?"

"Yeah... well, actually more fulfilling a party. He had a vision for how it would be and then he gave me a bottomless credit card to throw all the debt it racks up into..."

"I'm pretty sure the party requires you and I to go shopping," she said with a devilsh smirk to her voice.

I shook my head, "No-uh. With my luck, he'd spot that and deduct it out of my fifty-K," I said, shaking my head, "The card gets used strictly for party business only."

Addison's voice was disappointed, "I so did not raise you right," she said.

"Ughhhh," I groaned, "I have to find pearl white balloon arches and outdoor stereo equipment and chinese lantern lights and a bridge stage for the pool and a dancer and --"

"Hold up girl!" she shouted, "A dancer? Did you just say you need to find a dancer?"

"Yeah," I said.

Addison cleared her throat.

"I don't think he meant your kind of dancer."

"What the fuck other kind of dancer gets hired to do rich mens' parties?" Addison asked, "Besides, I do dancing that doesn't include taking my clothes off too, you know." She paused. "Tell Nick his lap dances are on the house."

"You are kidding me right now, aren't you?" I asked.

Addison's voice was serious. "Hell no I'm not! Me and my girls, we'd be perfect. We could rock the Carter Casa! We do it all, you know, we're a full package. Sing, dance, strip."

"Addie, I don't know..." I said, "The whole point of him throwing this party is to get Cora to --"

"-- to break up with Hugh Walters, right? What better way to break them up like shrapnel than have her catch him cheating on her with a slutty dancer at Nick's party?" Addison's voice was excited.

"And are you gonna be the slutty dancer that gets him to cheat?" I asked pointedly.

"Oh hell no," Addison responded, "Of course not. That's a special priviledge we save for the girl o the bottom of the shit stack," she laughed. "Like sending an intern to get coffee."

"Or a fake personal assistant you hired as a private investigator," I muttered.

"'Scusa?"

"He asked me to pick up coffee this morning. And multigrain bagels. And guitar strings."

Addison was quiet a moment. "Okay so Sam, I'm gonna need an answer before I can pretend to give a shit about anything else you say. And it's okay if you say no, but I gotta admit, I'm gnona pretty much hate you until the day we die if you say no."

"Addie, I don't know if it's a good idea," I said.

"How could it not be a good idea?" she asked, voice pitching, "How many girls can say that they've gotten naked in front of Nick Carter?"

"Probaby a lot," I answered.

"And got paid to do so," she added.

"Still a lot," I answered dryly.

Addison laughed, "Stop raining on my parade! Please hire me to dance at the party? Pleasepleasepleaseplease --"

As she continued begging, my phone vibed, indicating a second call coming in. "Hang on a second," I interrupted Addison. It was Nick on the other line. "Hey," I said when I'd put Addie on hold and switched over, "Quick question."

"I -- uh.. Yeah?"

"When you said dancers earlier, when we were talking about the party entertainment, did you mean strippers?"

"What else would I mean?"

"Just wanted to make sure. Hold on a second."

"Uhhh ---"

I switched back to Addison. "You still here?"

"Yeah?"

"Nick's on the other line. You gotta job, and I gotta go."

Addison's squeal echoed through the phone, "OH MY GOD, I'm SO EXCITED RIGHT NOW!"

"I gotta go," I said. "He's on the other line."

"Okay! Tell him he won't regret this decision!"

"I just hope I don't regret it," I came back at her. "I gotta go. I'll call you later."

"Bye!!!"

I switched back to Nick. "I just booked our entertainment."

"Sweet." His voice sounded funny. "Hey, could you do me a favor?"

"Sure, what's up?"

"I need a ride."

"A ride?"

"Yeah..." Nick laughed, "I'm drunk."

Chapter Twelve


"This is ridiculous," I muttered to myself as I glanced between the Google Maps display on my phone and the street, hunkered down against the wheel, squinting at the street signs. I couldn't believe that in two days' time I'd gone from a mostly-normal overnight housekeeper at the hotel downtown to what was shaping out to be Nick Carter's baby sitter. A baby sitter that was making fifty-grand, sure, but a baby sitter nonetheless. And at midnight, in the ghettoy downtown streets of Los Angeles, picking his drunk ass up at a bar, I was inclined to think that maybe fifty-grand wasn't enough.

Finally I spotted the street and I turned up it, rolling into the parking lot of a nasty looking bar with music so loud it was shaking the pavement out front. A girl was wretching into a bush and a half a block away a guy was taking a leak on the side of the building. "Classy," I muttered, putting my car into park. I pulled out my cell phone and tried calling Nick, but he didn't pick up so I hung up and texted him. Where are you? How am I supposed to find you in this mess?

But before the text was even sent, I got my answer.

The front door of the bar burst open and a group of four guys came out, three of them shoving the fourth one - whose blonde hair I recognized instantly from across the lot. "Oh Jesus Chris," I muttered and I started trotting toward the cluster.

"Keep your fucking hands off my girl," one of the guys shouted, shoving Nick squarely in the chest so that he stumbled backward.

Nick only just caught his balance, but he did with a certain amount of dignity. "She came onto me!" he shouted, "I was just giving her a damn autograph!"

"Autograph my ass!" yelled the thug, "You had your hands all over her boobs, I saw it!"

"That's what she wanted signed!" Nick yelled. "DO YOU KNOW WHO I AM?" His voice echoed off the buildings surrounding the bar.

The thugs clustered around him tighter, "Course we know who you are, twinkle toes," one of the two friends laughed.

"Backdoor Boy," the other spat.

"I could take any one of you pussies any day," Nick slurred, his voice running the words together, "Any time, one hand behind my back..." He stumbled and almost fell to the left.

"What'd you call me?" hissed the first guy.

"Pussy," Nick said real nice and slow and announciated, letting his lips really form the word.

I got there just after the first guy swung.

The punch caught Nick right in the side of the head and knocked him not quite out cold, but cold enough that he lost his balance and I only just caught him before he went all the way down. The two friends were hooting and the first guy spat off to the side. "Sorry about the mess, m'am," he said to me, nodding, and stomped away.

Nick's eye was already swelling.

"For Christ's sake," I muttered, staring down at him, "What in hell were you thinking?"

He blinked up at me, "Sam?" he asked, "Did I win the fight then?"

"No. You lost. A lot. C'mon," I said, and I started pulling him along toward my car.

He followed, stumbling, and I opened the passenger door and pushed him in. He smacked his head on the door and cursed as he sank into the seat. "Watch your fingers," I said as I slammed the door shut. Nick's head rolled back and forth as he moaned. I ran around to the driver's side and climbed in, then glanced over and realized Nick's buckle wasn't done. I leaned over and pulled it across him, securing him in.

"Thanksmuch for coming to get me," he murmured, and his head dozed forward and he fell asleep.

Or passed out or something.

"Think nothing of it, you're paying me to do it," I answered.

It took me a little shy of an hour and a half to find my way through West Hollywood to the housing community where Nick lived and it wasn't until I'd pulled up to the gate that I realized I didn't have a clue how I was gonna get in to drop him off. I glanced over at him. "Nick," I said, "Wake up."

He groaned, but didn't wake up.

I reached over and shook him and his eyelids fluttered. "Wake the fuck up," I snapped.

"Whyyyyy?" he groaned.

"I don't know how to get in your stupid community, it's like Fort Knox or something."

"You need the gate pass," he muttered, "It's in the glovebox."

"We're in my car," I said.

Nick squinted around, "Oh...yeah. It's in my car's glove box."

I slammed my hands against the steering wheel. "Are you kidding me? You let me drive all the way out here without telling me it was in your god-damn glove box?"

He blinked at me in surprise at my anger, "I was asleep, how was I supposed to know that --"

"I CAME TO PICK YOU UP AND BRING YOU HOME! OF COURSE YOU KNEW I WAS DRIVING YOU HOME!" I shouted.

"I forgot to tell you about the --"

"Of course you forgot! Just like you forgot the bagels and just like you didn't mention there's only one fucking balloon vendor in the entire state of Cali-fucking-fornia that sells pearl white balloon arches!!!" I slammed my car door open, got out and walked to the back end of the car. I paced a moment, blowing off steam. I could see him struggling with the belt buckle in the car. I sighed as I watched his silhouette. He was too drunk to figure out how to undo it. "Ughhhh..." I walked back to the door and got back in. "I'm sorry I yelled at you," I said. "You're drunk, you can't help but be a moron right now."

He looked at me with pouty eyes. "I'm sorry I forgot about the bagels and the gate pass. And I didn't know about the balloons."

"I know," I said. I turned in my seat and started to back up.

"Are we going to get the gate pass?" he asked.

"No," I said, "I'm just gonna have to take you back to my place. I'm not driving all the way back to the bar tonight then back here then back home. We'll just got get your car tomorrow morning when you're sobered up enough to drive yourself home, that's all." I pulled out onto the main road.

"You're taking me back to your place?" he asked.

"Apparently," I answered, "What else am I supposed to do with you? Drop you off on skid row?"

Nick grinned a drunken, stupid grin at me, "Are you taking advantage of me in my drunken state, Miss. Roades?"

I glanced over at him. "In your dreams, Carter."

Chapter Thirteen


I have to admit that I was a little tempted - at least once before the night was through - to "take advantage of Nick in his drunken state", though.

He fell asleep on the drive back to my house, face pressed to the window and face slack. I glanced over a couple times and couldn't help but think he looked like a little kid on a long road trip the way his cheek was flattened against the glass. When we got to the house, I roused him a little gentler than I had at the gate in front of his community, shaking his shoulder. "Nick... we're here. Wake up."

He blinked and lifted his face from the glass. "Oww... God, what happened?" he muttered. He touched his face tenderly where a welt was already building up. He looked into the mirror on the back of the visor. "Oh God."

"You autographed some guy's girlfriend's breasts from what I could gather by the fight," I said. "C'mon inside, I'll get you some ice for it."

Nick struggled to get out of the seatbelt again, still not fully sober, and I reached over and detached it for him. He rolled himself out of the car and onto his feet, and I led the way up the steps and into the house. I waved at the living room, "The couch is in there, go make yourself comfortable and I'll be right back."

"Make myself comfortable?" Nick chuckled as he walked into the living room.

I rolled my eyes and went into the kitchen and pulled my freezer door open and started rooting around. My ice trays were both empty. I shoved them into the sink to remind me to make new ice and searched for something that could be used as a compact. I came up a bag of frozen broccoli.

When I went out to the living room, Nick was laying on his back on the sofa. He'd taken his shirt off and was posing like he was trying out for a spread in the next issue of Play Girl magazine. "Put this on your stupid face," I said, dropping the broccoli onto his chest.

Nick doubled up around the ice-cold bag of veggies. "Christ," he hooted, "You could kill a guy doing that!"

"Next time I'll try harder," I replied smartly, and I dropped myself into a chair across the room from him.

Nick pouted as he put the broccoli onto the side of his face and stared over at me. "You're mad," he said.

"A little bit," I replied.

"Aw babe, c'mon," he whimpered.

"Nick, look at your face. You could've gotten yourself - and me - killed. What the hell were you thinking? All because you had to act like a colossal douche bag."

"I was drunk, I wasn't really thinking at all," he said.

"Well maybe you shouldn't drink if it makes all the stupid come out," I commented.

Nick moved the broccoli a little so I couldn't see his eyes. His lower lip slackened. "I drank 'cos I'm sad," he said quietly, almost ashamed. "And frustrated, too. But mostly sad."

I wasn't sure if this was a ploy or not, so I sat still for a moment, letting the words stew. I licked my lips. I didn't wanna just let him off the hook, but I also kinda wanted to hear what he had to say. But not if it was just bait to get him out of trouble. I studied him a moment. He stared down at his lap from under the broccoli.

I sighed, "What's wrong?" I asked, a distinct feeling that I was gonna regret asking consuming me even as the words came out of my mouth.

"I was thinkin' about what you said earlier," he said, "About Cora not seeing me and how do I know she's the one if she hasn't seen me yet and what if she doesn't ever see me..." he shrugged. "I just -- I want her to see me so bad, and I feel like I can make anyone see me -- anyone in the world. Except her." He looked up at me, the broccoli bending around his temple. "She's the only one I want. I want her to love me so bad it hurts." His voice was low, scratchy, pained. "You ever felt like that before?"

I hesitated. "In fact, I have felt like that before," I confessed.

Nick lowered the broccoli. "What'd you do?"

I chewed my lip, "I tried everything to get his attention, but nothing ever worked."

"Ever?"

I shook my head.

"Who was it?" he asked.

"My dad," I answered, "All I wanted in the world was to do right by him. He died without saying he was proud of me. But then again, what is there to be proud of?"

Nick stared at me. "There's lots to be proud of, Sam," he said. "I don't know you well enough yet to tell you the exact things in a list or anything, but I can tell that there's lots and lots he could've been proud of."

"Thanks," I said quietly.

He put the broccoli down on the coffee table and struggled to his feet. He walked across the room to the mantle over the stone fireplace and stared down at the photographs my mother had always kept lining the shelf, which I hadn't had the heart to move yet. He pointed at a family portrait taken three Christmases before they'd died. "Brother?" he asked.

"Yeah. Jake," I said.

Nick's eyes moved away from that picture, on to another where my mom had put both our first grade pictures together, and the next where Jake was in his graduation cap and gown, followed by me in mine. Nick bent closer to read the diploma I was holding up in the picture. "Samantha Catherine Roades," he mumbled, "English major." He nodded, then turned to look at me. "College graduate. You must be very smart."

"Not really," I answered.

"Probably Valedictorian," he said.

"....fourth in my class," I muttered.

Nick grinned. "Out of thousands, I'm sure." He kept looking at the photos, then came to the very end, a picture of me and Jake on our little league team, both covered in dirt. "You said your dad died."

"My mom, too."

"How?" he asked.

"Car wreck," I answered. "Rainy night on a drive upstate, a deer ran out and they swerved and ran head-on into a tractor trailer. Both of them died instantly."

"And your brother?"

"Turned radical Christian nutcase, ala Kirk Cameron. Right off the deep end. He lives somewhere in the Bible belt kissing some preacher's ass and sending prayers heavenward for my eternal soul which he's certain is bound to damnation." I forced a smile, even as the words broke my heart.

Nick chortled, "Sounds like Brian's wife and me..." He returned to the couch and sat back down, grabbed the broccoli, and leaned back into the cushions, pressing the broccoli bag to his head. "Was I really being a douche tonight?" he asked.

"I believe I heard you shout the phrase do you know who I am," I replied.

Nick winced.

"And I think you were trying to make a pass at me," I said, smirking.

"Did I?" he asked.

"You asked if I wanted to take advantage of you in your drunken state."

He lowered the broccoli. "Do you?"

My mouth went dry. But I managed to shake my head.

Nick laughed, "You're a fucking liar. Everyone wants to take advantage of me..." he smiled sadly as he replaced the broccoli once more, covering his eyes from my view, "And most people do."

Chapter Fourteen


I woke up the next morning curled up in the chair in my living room. Nick was spawled across the couch, the thawed broccoli still balanced on his forehead. I had a terrible crick in my neck and I winced as I fought to stand upright. As I walked by, I grabbed the bag of broccoli off Nick's face and had to refrain from gasping at the sight of the swollen black eye that marred his otherwise peaceful face. He barely moved when I took the broccoli away.

In the kitchen, I tossed the ruined vegetables into the garbage and grabbed a bottle of water from the fridge. Checking in on Nick one last time, I went into the bathroom and started a shower.

I closed my eyes as the hot water washed over me, taking with it the residue from the day before and the soap that I was lathering up with. I used my scrubby brush to get my back. Once I'd washed up, I leaned against the wall and turned the heat up as high as I could stand and just let the hot water wash over my back, soothing the ache in my neck and spine from having slept in the stupid chair all night. I closed my eyes and moaned appreciation for the hot water.

That's when the door to the bathroom opened and Nick walked in.

I quickly covered my breasts with my arms and crossed my legs. I poked my head out around the shower curtain, "Do you mind?" I started to ask, but I couldn't finish the sentence because before I could, Nick had pushed the lid up on the toilet and reached for his fly. "OH God!" I yelped and I jumped backwards, slipped in the tub, and fell to the floor, scraping my back on the faucet as I went down.

"Shit, are you okay?" Nick asked. His voice sounded panicked. He reached for the shower curtain.

"DON'T open that!" I yelled.

"But you fell down --"

"I'M NAKED!" I shouted, "Don't open that. Give me a towel."

"Are you okay?"

"I'm fine. Give me a towel."

There was a pause and a moment later one of the blue towels that hung on the hook by the door was passed around he curtain. I stretched to reach for it and a pain shot up my back. "Ow," I groaned. I grabbed the towel and wrapped it as best I could over myself. "Okay."

"Okay? I can open the curtain now?"

"Yeah."

Nick opened it and he stared down at me. "I'm sorry," he said. He offered out his hand. I took it, and he carefully pulled me to my feet. Pain shot through my back and I winced even harder. "Are you bleeding?" Nick pointed at the bottom of the tub, where a small pool of blood had formed.

"Apparently," I muttered.

Nick frowned. "Do you have a first aid kit?"

"Under the sink."

He turned and rooted around under there while I gingerly stepped out of the tub, clinging to the handle in the wall. He opened the kit and dug out Neosporin and a bandage. "Turn around," he said gently.

"The towel doesn't cover the back," I argued.

"It's okay, I won't look."

I knew I shouldn't trust him not to look, but I turned around anyway because it hurt and I really wanted the Neosporin. I felt his fingers working on my back as he put the cool cream on and dobbed it around with his fingertip. Then he ripped open the bandage and pressed it over the wound carefully. "There..." he said. "There ya go, you're good."

I turned forward again. "Thanks," I said.

"I owed ya one after you came for me last night. And for the broccoli," he added.

"I guess we're even then," I said.

"It appears that way," he replied.

"You have a nice ass," he commented.

"I said not to look!" I cried.

Nick shrugged.

"Ugh."

"At least I said it was nice," he pointed out.

I didn't answer. I could feel the flush rising up my chest and neck into my face and the grin in his eyes only brightened as I turned redder. I pushed out of the bathroom, doing my best to keep everything covered. I hurried up the stairs to the bedroom and quickly changed clothes. I put on a pair of sweatpants because my jeans were too tight across my new fleshwound. But a quick look in the mirror showed Nick had dressed it quite well.

When I came back downstairs a few minutes later, slowly because my back was now hurting, Nick was standing in the living room looking at the photographs on the mantle again. I hovered in the door for a moment before he realized I was there. "Were you close to your mom?" he asked.

"Not particularly," I answered. "They always liked Jake more. Which I guess is why it's so weird that I'm the one that cares about the house enough to be so desperate to keep it that I'll accept crazy job offers from perfect strangers..." I raised an eyebrow.

Nick's mouth curled into a smirk.

"Are you hungry? I just bought stuff to make omlets..."

"I'm always hungry, you'll learn that about me," he said. He followed me into the kitchen, watching as I moved stiffly, trying not to disturb the gash on my back. "You sure you're okay?" he asked, his voice was concerned.

"Yeah," I replied. I reached for a lower cupboard and found that it hurt to bend down to get a pan. Nick rushed over and cut in front of me, grabbed the pan and put it on the stove.

"Sit," he said, waving at the bar stools by the breakfast nook counter.

"But what about breakfast?" I asked, "You said you were hungry."

"Allow me, mon cherie," he replied, and he looked around, "Where's your utensils drawer?" I pointed. He pulled open the drawer as I wriggled onto the bar stool. Holstering a spatula in his belt loop, he also grabbed a wooden spoon, a knife, and a whisk, then opened my fridge and pulled out the stuff for omlets. He grinned, "You're lucky... Eggs are one of the few things I can cook."

And he set to work.

Chapter Fifteen


"He was drunk and in your house, on your couch, shirtless and you didn't take advantage of him?!?" Addison's voice hit a register I think only dogs and parakeets could hear. "For crying outloud. I'm getting you tested. That's it."

I took a long sip of the smoothie that I was drinking and tried to keep a low profile as people around us were glancing over disapprovingly. It was the ice cream shop all over again. Except this time I'd foot the bill for our treats instead of her. But I have to admit that as crazy as the notion sounded (and as much as it offended the people around us), Addison's question did have me kind of wondering what was wrong with me. Her shock was sort of valid. I mean, it'd been a perfect opportunity, and I did kind of want to... I mean, Nick's abs were rock solid and his chest has these perfectly sculpted outlines like the bare chest of a Ken doll. Only, you know, not plastic or stoodgey like a Ken doll is.

"Maybe there's nothing wrong with me," I said, "Maybe I just respect him too much to take advantage of him," I said. "Besides... he's a good guy, Addie. I think he gets taken advantage of enough without me doing it too." I looked down at my smoothie, "The way he said that people take advantage of him... I mean, I think he was trying to pass it off as funny, but it wasn't funny. Not to him. He meant it... Nick deserves better." I looked up. "I kinda felt bad for him."

Addison was grinning.

"What?"

Her grin deepened to a smirk.

"What?" I asked again.

"Nick Carter is a man whore," Addison said carefully, "Everyone in LA knows that."

"Maybe he's not as man whorish as everyone thinks," I argued.

Addie's eyes were glistening with the smirk playing on her lips. "The guy dated Paris Hilton," she said, "Man whore."

"But he's changed since then, that was a long time ago," I said. "There's a lot more to him than that."

Addison raised an eyebrow.

"There is," I said. "He can be really sweet. And gentle. And I mean sure, he's kind of self-centered and a little bit of a tool, but I don't think he means to be, not honestly, he's just the product of being a child star. He's deeper than that."

"You're falling for him," Addison said.

"What?" I guffawed so harshly into my straw that the smoothie bubbled. "Oh my God, what are you, insane? I'm not falling for him --"

Addison was practically glowing, "Yes you are," she said.

"No I'm not!" I cried, "And even if I was, he's in love with Cora -- he'd never go for me. So this is all of a moot point."

Addison shook her head, "It's not a moot point," she said, "It's a very, very valid point. You're insanely jealous of Cora, aren't you?"

"I am not!" I cried.

"Awful defensive," she said, and sucked her smoothie straw with a look of triumph on her face.

"I've been busting my ass working for the last two days on a party for him so he can impress her, why would I do that if I didn't want him to impress her? If I didn't want them to end up together?" I demanded.

"So when it falls apart you can say you tried everything to help them work so you don't feel like you stole her man when you get him," Addison said.

"That's insane! Nick Carter would never go for someone like me."

Addison grinned. "Do you hear how you're saying his name? You say it like one of those swooning chicks that faun over Gaston in Beauty in the Beast."

"Do not!"

She laughed, "Deny it all you want, sweetie, but I know you better than that."

I crossed my arms over my chest and pouted. I wasn't falling for Nick Carter..... was I? My eyebrows stitched together in concern as I started thinking about it. I felt a flush starting to rise up in my neck. Addie laughed, "Sam, it's okay, you know."

"No it's not," I said, "He's Nick Carter." That time I heard it, the ring of fauning in my voice like those swooning girls. "Oh God," I muttered, and I dropped my forehead to my arm, staring down at the table.

"Yeah," Addison said, "But... he's Nick Carter."



-----



That night, I couldn't help but worry that every time I said his name that the person on the other end of the phone line could hear the swooning girl in my voice.

And I said his name quite a few times that evening as I called various vendors trying to get his party vision completed. It turned out that his name was magic - like a secret password that I'd discovered to unlock doors. For example, when a caterer had said they were booked straight through the next few weeks, I simply pointed out that it was a party that Nick Carter was throwing and the next thing I knew she had a clear schedule of availability... and I'd found a party supply store that sold the exact color balloons Nick wanted and they were willing to sell me the balloons for another vendor to create a balloon arch with...

Seriously, magic.

So there I was come ten-thirty, feet up, bluetooth headset in my ear, munching on a bag of Bugles, scribbling notes onto a notepad, looking up various party elements on the Internet and making a list of vendors to call the next day with my new-found magic word, when my phone rang and it was Nick.

"Hey," he said, his voice hushed. "How's your back?"

I had about four pillows smooshed up behind it to keep me comfortable and I was about three Advil deep trying to numb the pain. "It's better than it was, but I'm still really sore," I said.

"Good, I'm glad you're doing a lil better. It's gonna be real sore tomorrow," he commented. He paused. "Did you change out the bandage?"

I smiled. I couldn't believe he'd thought to ask me this. "Yeah," I said, "I did actually. Thank you for reminding me, though."

"Yeah no problem. Cuts like that just get real nasty if you leave'em...you know."

"Yeah," I said.

There was a long pause. Finally, he said, "Look, I um... I know you're sore but is there any chance you could do me a huge favor?"

"Sure," I said. I thought about Addison and her accusing me of falling for him and my heart skipped a beat as I realized that she was probably right. I felt like I would've said yes to anything he asked of me right about then. "What can I do for you?" I asked, my mouth going dry.

"Could you pick something up for me and come by my place?" he asked.

"Sure. What'cha need?"

There was a long pause.

"Condoms."

I dropped the phone.



-----



My hands were shaking as I walked through Walgreens, my cellphone to my ear. "I've never bought... condoms... before," I hissed.

"It's okay. Be cool." Addison's voice was smooth.

"I don't even know like what to get. Do condoms come in sizes? What size do I get him? Oh Jesus. I'm sweating. I literally have sweat all over my body."

"Don't sweat too much, you'll wreck the lingerie you just put on."

"Oh God." I looked down, painfully aware of the curves that my best lingerie created on my body. Thanks to Addison and her squeaks of delight when I called her to tell her about Nick requesting condoms, I'd felt the need to replace my granny panties and stretchy athletic bra with the silky lacy variety that hid in the depths of my underwear drawer.

"Does he have a large forefinger?" Addison asked.

"What?"

"If he stretched out his thumb and forefinger, how long would it be?"

"I don't know!"

"Does he have long fingers?"

"I guess so! Why?"

"Get large," she said. "And get the ribbed ones! Oh my God, get the glow in the dark ones, they're so fun... This one time, I had the glow in the dark ones at work in the VIP room and ---"

"I don't wanna hear this," I said. I stepped into the aisle with the condoms, started to hover, then chickened out and promptly turned and started looking at a large display of Vagisil. Because somehow that was less embarassing feeling than condoms. "Oh God, I can't do this."

"You can do this," Addison coached me.

"I'm staring at vaginal soap, Addie," I muttered, "I can't turn around to grab the damn condoms. My hands are shaking. I can't breathe. Oh God, I'm going to die in the feminine hygeine and birth control section of a Walgreens." I fanned myself.

"Samantha Roades, listen to me. Do you want to sleep with this man, yes or no?"

"Yes," I squeaked.

"Then unless you plan on being his baby momma you're gonna need to turn around and get condoms."

I sucked in my breath.

"Do it."

"I --"

"DO IT NOW!" Addison shouted at me.

I turned around, snatched the first box labeled Large that I saw and made a beeline for the registers at the front of the store. "Oh God, oh God, oh God," I squealed as I moved through the store.

"Save that for when you get to Carter's place," Addison commented dryly.

"Oh God, oh God..." I made it to the register and of course it was a guy at the lane and I put my purchase, plus two magazines, a pack of gum, and a mini eyeglasses repair kit onto the counter. I couldn't make eye contact with him as he rung each of the items. It might've been my imagination, but he seemed to linger on the condoms before putting them in the bag. I felt my cheeks heat up.

After I'd paid, I carried my bag of shame to the car.

"That wasn't so hard now was it?" Addison asked.

"Yes it was," I said. "He's probably in there right now telling the other workers how I'm gonna shag someone tonight."

"Unless he was british, he's not saying shag dear," Addison said, "And trust me if he's talking about you shagging it's with a tone of jealousy that it's not his weiner getting bagged, okay? So relax."

"You're terrible," I said.

"Well it's true," Addison replied.

"Oh God," I leaned back in the car seat and closed my eyes.

Addison laughed.

"What?" I asked, "What could possibly be funny right now?"

"Just that I told you this was going to happen."

"Did not."

"Did too! Remember?" Addison said frantically, "And when he ravishes you on the hood of his car... I want every last dirty detail."

Chapter Sixteen


"Hey... Hey... Hi... Hello... Good evening... How you doin'..." I was staring into my own eyes in the mirror on the driver's side visor, testing out various greetings in various tones of voice. If anyone was watching me, they'd think I was fucking mental. My palms left streaks of sweat across the steering wheel. "Hey... Hey..." I took a deep breath. "Fuck me, Carter, fuck me like I've never been fucked before." I laughed. Like I'd ever have the guts to say that -- ever! I licked my lips.

I was just gonna have to wing it.

Finally, I grabbed the box of condoms out of the car, walking slowly toward the door of his house. Each step seemed to make my heart beat faster until I climbed the stoop and pressed the door bell. I thought I might throw up with anticipation into one of the bushes.

The door opened.

"Hey," I squeaked before my eyes fully registered what was standing before me.

Cora. In Nick's t-shirt. It hung to her thighs and I had a feeling if she turned around her ass cheeks were probably hanging out from below the hem. She stared at me. "Who the fuck are you?" she asked.

Nick suddenly came up behind her, buttoning his pants. "Sam!" he said. His eyes landed on the condoms. "Oh thank God." He grinned. "Thanks." He reached out and I put the box into his hands, "I literally can't thank you enough."

Cora looked between Nick and I and back again. "This is your personal assistant?" she asked, surprised. "This is Sam?"

"Yeah, this is Sam," Nick said. "Who'd you think?"

"I dunno, I just assumed Sam was a -- well, a man," she said.

"Why the hell would you think that?" Nick laughed.

"Because of the name Sam for starters?" Cora asked.

"It's short for Samantha," I squeaked.

Nick shook the box at Cora. "And look." He grinned, "We've been replenished."

Cora stared at the box a second, then looked at me. "Thanks." She took the box and headed back into the house. Consequently, when she turned around I noticed that I was right about her ass cheeks.

Nick leaned against the door frame. "Hey thanks. I'm glad your back is doing better, by the way." He grinned. "I'd ask you to stay but we're uh, kinda busy..." he grinned.

"Yeah."

"I'll call you tomorrow though, okay babe?" he asked. He grinned, "I had this great idea for the party... We should get like custom made party hats... And they should be like little top hats with like that thing like the reporters wore, you know and on that it says The Most Awesome Party Ever or something like that. You know?"

I nodded.

He smiled. "You're amazing."

"Thanks," I muttered.

"Thank you again," he said. He paused and looked me up and down. "...You look real good tonight, by the way," he added. And just like that, he ducked backwards and closed the door.

I stood there staring at it for a moment, then I turned and walked back to my car, my face flushing, ears ringing. I wanted to get as far-the-fuck-away from there as I possibly could. I got in the car and started to back down the driveway when the door to the house opened and Nick came running across the driveway, waving his arms. I stopped and unrolled my window as he approached the car, his face flushed. "Hey," he said, panting. He held up the box of condoms, "I umm... hate to ask you to do this but..." he pointed at the box. "You got the wrong size."

I stared at the box. In my rush, I'd misread the box and grabbed a small.

A grin spread across his face, "I need large, babe."

"Sorry," I choked the word out.

He held the box out to me. "Any chance you could go back and exchange them?"

I nodded numbly.

"Thanks," he said. He clicked his tongue and winked, then turned and jogged back to the house, where Cora was standing in the doorway, still in his t-shirt.

I wanted to die.

I vowed to myself an hour later --- as I drove home after purchasing a new box of condoms from a different Walgreens (I've never been so thankful that they're on every damn corner before in my entire life) and dropping them off at Nick's house where Cora had greeted me at the door once more to accept them --- to never, ever, ever tell Addison what really happened. So I spent the rest of the night divising a fake story to tell her about how he'd swiped everything off his dining room table with one arm and how we'd done it like 23 times over the course of the evening... I'd tell her that I was so sore down there that I was walking like a cowboy.

I plotted all this as I ate an entire pint of Late Night Snack Ben & Jerry's ice cream.

And it was a waste of time anyways in the end because, when Addison called a couple hours later to check in for details, instead of telling her all the dirty details I'd made up, I burst into tears.

"What in the universe is the matter?" she asked, her voice confused.

"C-Cora was there. The condoms were for Cora," I gasped.

Addison's voice was gentle, "Aw honey."

"She doesn't even see him," I sobbed.

Chapter Seventeen


I spent the next twelve hours with Cora's song "Oh My" stuck in my head. This is the song that she was banned from like 27 countries for because the lyrics were so explicit and she spent half the song making orgasm noises without even singing. My stomach turned and I don't think I slept more than an hour the whole night. I just kept tossing and turning and seeing the grin on Nick's face and that wink of his.

I took out some of my anger unfairly on Addison, ignoring it when she tried calling me midmorning, because she was the only reason I'd even dreamed that the call for condoms had been directed at me. If it hadn't been for her, I would've just dropped the stupid things off and been done with it. If it hadn't been for her, I wouldn't even know that I liked him yet. He'd just be Nick still and my jealousy of Cora would still be at a minimum.

Around noon, Nick called and suggested I go over to plan the party some more with him and show him what I had already done by way of planning. So I grabbed my binder of notes and stuff and headed over, praying that Cora would be gone when I got there. I didn't think I could handle seeing her again so soon after last night. And my prayers were answered when I arrived at Nick's place. Cora was no where to be seen.

"So I was thinking it'd be fun to have those hats like I said last night," he said. "What do you think?"

"Yeah, they'd be cool," I said.

Nick grinned. "I like that we think alike," he said, waving his fingers between my head and his head, "Like the same wavelength." He grinned.

Not even close, I felt like saying. But I stayed quiet.

He led me into his kitchen and opened his fridge. "You want anything to drink?" he asked.

"No thanks," I answered. I looked around. His kitchen and dining room connected and were beautifully finished (everything in the house was beautifully finished for crying out loud), with exposed wood beams and dark wood cupboards. He had one of those fridges that were covered with wood that matched the cupboards and virtually dissapeared when it was closed. And his oven was built into a freestanding counter in the center. Seriously Food Network could've filmed a show in there. I pictured Rachel Ray or Giada Delaurentis cooking in there.

On the counter stood a purse.

"Is Cora still here?" I asked as casually as possible.

Nick turned from the fridge, closing it, and popping open a can of Pepsi. "No. Why?"

I pointed at the purse.

"She left it here last night," he said, "I called her and told her it was here, though. She said she'd come by and get it later." A smirk travelled across his mouth, "I think she left it here as an excuse to come back tonight." He took a sip of his Pepsi.

The purse was worth probably more than my house, not even counting anything of value that might be inside the thing.

Nick put his can down on the counter, "You sure you don't want anything?" he asked.

"Positive."

"Okay."

"So I booked a caterer," I said, since we were in the kitchen and I was thinking about food.

I told him about the food they offered and he rubbed his chin, nodding as I spoke. "That sounds good," he said, "But I know this other caterer... they're really good... They make dumplings, like Japanese or Chinese or something dumplings. Have you had dumplings?" I nodded. "I love dumplings," he commented. "Shit what's their name..." He tilted his head, thinking, squinting up at the ceiling. "Man..." he wagged his finger, "You know, I have a menu upstairs. One second, I'll go get it." And he jogged out of the room.

I looked at the purse.

I knew I shouldn't. But... I glanced at the doorway. He wa gonna be a minute anyway... So I inched closer to the counter where the purse was, my palms getting sweaty in that way that they do when I'm about to do something I shouldn't. I leaned on the counter next to it. Then moved my elbow and... accidentally... knocked it off the counter. "Oops," I muttered, and I bent down to pick it up.

Unzipping the bag, I peered inside. There was a thick wallet and a bejeweled cellphone and a ring of keys and a bunch of tampons and random make-up tubes. I picked up the cell phone and slid my finger across the screen, expecting it to be locked but finding it on the homescreen instead. She had seven missed calls from Hugh, three from Nick, and one from a number labeled simply with Z. I slid my thumb over the contact. I grabbed a pen from inside the purse and wrote the number down on the inside of my palm, then dropped the phone back in there. I rooted around a couple seconds. The bottom of the bag had an assortment of random crap including an unused condom still in its wrapper. I stared at the condom. Why in hell didn't they just use this one? Why did they have to call me to go get them condoms when they had one? I turned it over in my palm.

"So I found the menu," Nick was shouting and I heard him thundering down the stairs. I shoved everything back into the bag, pocketed the condom, and put the bag back on the counter. I nudged it back into the same position it was in when he left and quickly launched myself back to the spot I'd been in, making it only just as Nick came through the door of the kitchen, waving the menu. "Here it is," he said, dropping it in front of me. "Japanese dumplings," he said, pointing at a listing on the front, "See? They're so good. I love dumplings."

"I'll give'em a call and see if they're available," I said.

Nick grinned, "Great!" He waved for me to follow him, "C'mon, let's go outside, it's stuffy in here." He grabbed his Pepsi can and led the way out of the kitchen. I followed, glancing back guiltily at the purse. Nick trotted across the stairway and by the pool to a couple of lawn chairs set up by the beach, and he put his Pepsi can down on a tiny table that sat between them. I joined him, hugging my binder and the menu to my chest.

"So you found the balloon arches, then?" he asked.

I told him about the dramas I'd had finding the pearl white balloons and how I'd finally got the vendors to cooperate by name-dropping. I held out my binder so he could see the progress I'd made. He stared down at the binder, then turned it to one side... and the moment he did, I knew what page he was on. The info about Addison's group. I'd included a show flyer in the binder that she'd given me. He stared down at the picture. "Who is Addison Gray?" he asked.

"She's my best friend. She's a dancer," I replied.

He turned the binder, "Which one is she?"

The photo was of Addison's full cast. I pointed at her. "I hired them all though, not just her. They're really talented. I mean, I've seen their show. They sing and dance, too. It's like Moulin Rouge..."

Nick was staring at Addison. "She's pretty. She sings, you said?"

"Yeah."

"Is she any good?"

"I think so."

"Interesting."

"Why?"

He shrugged. "We're just looking for a new opening act for Cora's tour this summer," Nick explained.

"Addie's a stripper," I laughed, "She doesn't have an record deal or anything."

Nick shrugged and handed me the binder. "Looks like you're making some great progress on the party, though. I really appreciate it. I can't wait for you to meet Cora. You're going to like her." He smiled and took another sip of his Pepsi.

"I met her last night," I reminded him.

"Ehhh.. she was in a pissy mood last night," he said. "I don't know what her problem was. She was all worked up 'cos she thought you were a guy," he laughed.

"She was jealous," I commented.

Nick laughed, "Jealous? Of what? You? C'mon."

I raised an eyebrow, "What's that supposed to mean?"

"Just... I mean... I'd been telling her how I'd spent the night at your place and stuff, I guess," he said.

"Oh." I couldn't help but feel hurt at the words. I mean I knew Nick was way out of my league but the way he'd said that made me realize that he knew it, too, and I felt kind of silly sitting there, and even more embarassed for putting on my good lingerie the night before when he'd asked for condoms. How in hell did I ever listen to Addison and believe that he might seriously have intended the condoms to be for me? Of course he didn't.

He must've been picking up on the fact that I was upset because he said, "You looked real pretty last night."

I laughed. Mainly because I didn't know how else to respond.

"No really," he insisted, "You did. I thought you'd said you were just at home and stuff, or maybe that's just what I'd assumed, 'cos of your back, but you looked good. Were you out on a date or something?"

"Kind of," I mumbled.

Nick grinned. "I never asked you if there was someone in your life. Who's the lucky guy? Or girl?"

"Guy," I said.

"What's his name?"

"Ben," I said the first name that came into my head. "He's um - he's an architect." I nodded.

"Cool," Nick said, "I hope I get to meet him at the party."

"Oh I'm sure he'll be busy that night," I said.

"He works nights then?"

"Yeah sure," I replied.

"Too bad."

"Yeah."

Nick stood up suddenly. "Well," he said, "Anyways. I gotta get to the studio. You're welcome to come if you want to."

"I've got party business to attend to..." I said.

Nick nodded, "You're a hard worker. Best fake assistant I ever had." He smiled. "I'm looking forward to you meeting Hugh. I think it'll be interesting."

"Yeah, me too."

Nick led the way across the yard and back through the house to the front door, which he held open for me. He watched as I walked across the driveway to my car. "Hey," he shouted just before I got in. "You really think she was jealous?"

"Definitely," I replied.

His face broke into an excited smile. He waved, "Have a good day, Samantha!"

"You, too, Nick."

Chapter Eighteen


When I got home, because I didn't feel like calling about Nick's damn dumplings yet, I typed in the number labeled Z on Cora's phone into a reverse number look-up search. The power of Google. The number belonged to a music producer named Justin Platt who worked for one of Hugh Walters' labels. It took a couple more minutes before I found his address, which wasn't all that far away. I chewed on my fingernail as I stared at the screen, contemplating.

Well. Nick was paying me to be a private investigator.

I went just as I was - sweatpants and dirty concert tee and all - and drove the six miles to Justin Platt's house. I parked my car on the side of the road two houses down and stared at the moderate home that the phone number was connected to. I squinted at it. I couldn't picture Cora ever coming here, but that didn't particularly mean anything, did it? As casually as I could, I got out of the car and walked down the sidewalk toward the house, glancing around as I went. Nobody seemed to be home in any of the houses surrounding this one, so when I got to the driveway, I turned up it.

My mouth was dry from nerves by the time I reached the garage. I slowed down and hesitated in the driveway a moment, looking at the windows of the house, trying to spot a light on or movement of any kind and nothing happened. After a brief pause, I inched closer to the garage and peered into one of the windows. There were no cars inside. There were boxes and boxes all stacked around the place though until there was only a little space left for a car to fit, so I knew there was only one car that belonged in there. Which, I decided, probably meant Justin Platt lived here alone.

I moved closer to the house, feeling more bold now that I'd deduced that he wasn't home and stood on tip toe to see in one of the downstairs windows. I couldn't see a lot. It looked like a typical suburban home from what I could see.

I wasn't even entirely sure what it was that I was looking for. It wasn't like there was going to be a sign up that said Cora Walters fucks me here hanging up somewhere.

I moved around the side of the house to the backyard and looked around. There was a swimming pool and a couple lawn chairs back there, and leaning against one of the chairs was a golf club. But nothing else of interest. I sighed and started walking around to the front again. I was halfway around when I heard a car pull into the driveway. I ducked behind a bush and pressed my back to the house, my heart thumping wildly.

A car door slammed and I heard a couple voices, some laughter, and footsteps on the walkway. I held my breath. The front door opened, and a moment later it closed and I counted to ten, then ran like a bat out of hell across the lawn, passing the white Escalade in the driveway as I went, and rushed to my car a couple houses down. I flung myself into the drivers' seat, and drove off as quick as I could, barely able to breathe. "Oh for the love of God," I muttered.

I sat there trying to catch my breath for a few minutes. I'd never been so terrified in my entire life. And Nick had hired me as a private investigator? Please. I was an imposter. I wasn't Monkish, or feisty, or any of the other things that he thought I was. A waste of his money.

Then my eyes snapped open because something in my head clicked.

I got back out of the car and headed back toward the house, my heart pumping against my chest. I walked slowly toward the driveway. I was in deep shit if I got spotted. I crouched beside the neighbor's hedges, peered around at the Escalade.

It was Nick's.

I sat down in the dirt and pulled out my cell phone. Of course, this was so obvious. I dialed Nick's number. It took a couple rings before he answered it. "Heyyyyy-lo?" he drawled into the phone.

"Hey Nick," I said, "Just calling to see if you wanted the dumplings in chicken or pork for the party?"

"Hmmm... ummmm... pork, I guess."

"Awesome. Hey, you still at the studio? Do you or your buddies Z and Lawrence need anything?"

"Nawh man, I'm at Z's place," Nick answered, "We're good... Damn you really are the best personal assistant ever, man." He laughed, "Thanks, though."

"No problem."

"You need anything else besides the chicken or pork thing?" he asked.

"Nope," I answered, "You just gave me everything I need. Thanks." I hung up the phone.

So Nick's producer, Justin Platt - AKA, Z, was calling Miss. Cora at odd hours of the night. Why in hell would Justin "Z" Platt be calling Cora at all? I wondered. I scrambled out of the dirt behind the hedges and ran doubled-down toward my car, where I flung myself in and drove away.

Now the night I met Nick, he'd told me that him and Cora were discussing a BSB/Cora duet, but I'd thought that was complete bullshit then, as I thought it was now. However, what if Cora was the one who'd come up with the excuse, not Nick? What if Cora needed an excuse to tell Hugh Walters that made sense for her to be spending inordinate amounts of time with both Nick and with Z? What if Cora was using that same excuse to cover for both her affairs at once?

Mind blown.

Maybe I wasn't so bad at this P.I. stuff after all.

I called Addison, my anger at her for the whole condom-excitement thing disapparated as I just desperately needed somebody to bounce these ideas off of at this point. When she picked up the phone, I bypassed banal things like greetings and how-you-doin's and just launched into my tale of narrowly escaping being seen and discovering Cora's double-use-excuse.

"So... what do you think?" I finished.

"Holy shit," Addison muttered, "How many guys do you think she's doin'?"

"Well I know of at least three now -- Hugh, Z, and Nick."

"Are you going to tell Nick about all this?"

"Not yet," I said, "I need... proof. If I tell him this he's just gonna think I'm nuts without proof, and even if he believes me enough to confront her she'll just deny it."

"Good point. So how are you gonna get proof?"

"At the party," I said.

"Good thinking," Addison said.

"Speaking of the party," I switched gears, "I was talking to Nick earlier and he saw your flyer in the binder for the entertainer and he's really excited about you working the party."

"Really?" Addison squeaked with excitement.

"Yeah... Get this, though. He's interested in hearing you sing more than your dancing abilities."

"What?" Addison sounded surprised. "But... nobody's more interested in that. Why's he interested in that? What'd you tell him?"

"I told him you were an aspiring singer and he jumped on it," I rehashed the conversation. "He said that Cora's looking for an opening act."

Addison was dead silent for a second. "No. Fucking. Way."

"That's what he said."

"Oh my God. WHY DIDN'T YOU CALL ME IMMEDIATELY?" she shrieked. "I HAVE TO WORK ON MY VOICE! OHMYGOD!"

"Your voice is perfectly fine; loud, but fine," I said, holding the phone back from my ear, "And I didn't tell you 'cos I was mad at you for getting me excited for Nick sex and telling me I was falling for him."

Addison laughed, "You were mad at me? When?"

"This morning. I ignored your call."

Addison laughed, "Sweetie, if you're gonna get mad at someone, get really mad at them, or else they'll never even know you were mad in the first place."

She was always telling me that... because I never was very good at communicating when I was mad.

Chapter Nineteen


An entire day went by before I heard from Nick.

This was already so unusual - going a whole day without contact from him - that i worried he was angry with me for something. And the only thing I could think of was me spying on Z's house. I worried that when he finally did call it would be to fire me. So I spent the time working diligently to get the last loose ends of the party plans tied up and the hats he wanted ordered and, after much debate with the restaurant, an order of one thousand pork dumplings to be delivered to the party.

I wanted absolutely nothing but good news to tell him when he called me.

When Nick called me finally, it had nothing to do with the party.

Or, surprisingly enough, Cora.

Or Z.

"Sam! It's movie night, you coming?"

He said it like this was a weekly thing. Maybe it was, I dunno, but this was the first week that I'd been involved, yet he sounded like I should've known. "On the marquee for tonight's features we have a short animated film from the makers of Looney Toons, followed by Speed, and wrapping up the evening with, in my humble opinion, a true classic for all ages, Nightmare on Elm Street."

"A classic for all ages, huh?" I laughed.

Nick laughed, too, "Yes, all ages. Every age. Infant to a hundred."

"So when you turn one hundred and one?"

"Your heart can't take it after that," he said in a regretful tone. "But you, babe, are not a hundred and one. So... are you coming by? I've got movie theater butter popcorn and Dr. Pepper and Red Vines."

I laughed, "What time?"

"Five-thirty?" he suggested.

"Okay then, it's a date," I said. And the moment the words were out of my mouth, I wanted to suck them back in. I smacked my hand against my face. Oh God.

But Nick either didn't notice the word (or the handsmack) or he was gentlemanly enough not to mention either. "Perfect. See you at five-thirty," he said, and hung up.

I spent the next couple hours in another squealy what-to-wear frenzy with Addison, who couldn't actually come over this time because she was at the club, but luckily knew my closet even better than I do and was able to help me assemble decent movie-going attire from the shambles of my own wardrobe.

When I got to Nick's, I honestly expected there to be a crowd or something. Instead, the driveway was empty save for Nick's white Escalade, and when I rang the bell he came to the door in a pair of sweatpants and a Guns & Roses t-shirt. He had a grin as he chimed, "Hey! You made it!" He ushered me into the house and I shuffled along behind him through the house to the kitchen, which smelled of popcorn. On the counter stood two big plastic containers shaped like classic movie theater popcorn boxes filled to the top with buttery popcorn. Next to it was a tub of crispy Kentucky Fried Chicken. "I got a hankerin'," he explained. He pulled open a cupboard and withdrew a bag of Red Vines.

"A hankering, huh?" I asked, a teasing smirk on my face.

Nick laughed, "It's a very Kentucky word to say... what else would you have for KFC? A craving? Please, woman." He waved his hand.

I laughed. "So..." I leaned against the counter as he slid the Red Vines my direction and pulled open the fridge, "Who else is coming?" I turned the Red Vines over and read the label.

"Nobody," Nick answered.

I looked up as he put the two bottles of soda pop in front of me. That's when I spotted Cora's purse, still sitting on the counter. "She still hasn't come for her bag?" I asked, gesturing at it.

Nick turned to look and his brow furrowed, a frown crossing his face, "Nawh," he said, "Not yet." He sighed, and I could tell he was upset about it. "It's only been three days, though, I mean, usually it's at least a week between when she comes to see me so..." He shrugged.

"Must be nice to be able to just forget your purse somewhere," I commented. "If I left my purse somewhere I'd freak the fuck out and have to stop the presses 'til I went back for it."

Nick shrugged. "She's Cora, what can I say? She doesn't give a fuck about anything." He laughed, "Not even me." He grabbed the chicken, one of the popcorns, and his soda. "Anyways, c'mon, grab your stuff. The show's about to start." He hurried out of the room and away from the conversation.

In the living room, Nick bounced down a couple steps to the inset couch and put his stuff down unceremoiously on the big square coffee table in the center. He threw himself backwards onto the couch and grabbed a pillow, which he put on his lap, legs spread wide and remote already in hand. He watched as I took the steps a little more delicately and had this awkward pause trying to decide where to sit in proximity to him. I knew where I wanted to sit, but given the whole Cora thing I wasn't sure if that was... I don't know, appropriate.

Luckily, Nick caught my awkwardness and, with a chuckle, pet the cushion beside him. "I don't bite," he commented.

"You might," I answered, but I moved over and put my stuff down before sitting on the couch directly beside him, neatly tucking my long legs under me.

Nick smiled as he watched me sit. "You have nice limbs," he commented.

I laughed, "You're crazy."

"No, I'm serious, I thought so the day I saw your ass, too, but I was too busy focusing on your ass to comment on your legs, you know?"

I smacked his shoulder, "Shut up," I felt a blush coming on.

Nick's eyes twinkled. "I wouldn't mind seeing it again sometime actually."

"Only if you're going to kiss it."

Nick laughed, "Oh you are a dirty girl, aren't you, Samantha Catherine Roades?"

I raised an eyebrow. "You know what I meant, Carter."

He laughed and pressed a button on the remote. The lights dimmed and the screen snapped on and a loading symbol lit up in the center. While the TV loaded, Nick leaned forward for his chicken bucket, which he balanced on the pillow. "You know," he said, digging through the pieces, "You're bad at taking compliments."

"No I'm not."

"See, there you go again," he said, smirking.

I shook my head, "Telling me I don't take compliments well isn't giving me a compliment, it's actually the opposite," I pointed out. But even as I argued with him I knew he was right. I don't take compliments well. I don't know how to react to them. It's possibly one of the most awkward things in the entire world for me - taking a compliment.

"You know what I mean," Nick mimicked me, raising his eyebrow.

"Shush," I said as the screen loaded a picture, "The movie's starting."

Nick found what he was looking for in his chicken bucket, then offered it to me, but I waved it away. He tucked the bucket between his knees and started munching on the breaded chicken as a Looney Toons cartoon started on the screen. It was the Road Runner and the Coyote. As it played, Nick laughed like a little kid, his nose bunching up grin spreading almost to his ears every time the Wiley E.'s plan backfired. He slapped his knee, even. I kept stealing glances at him. He was funnier than the cartoon. What I wouldn't give to watch him watch cartoons all night... I thought to myself. The chicken was leaving greasy crumbs on the mantle of his shirt.

I have to say, too, that his sound system was everything he'd promised on the initial tour of his house. He hadn't exaggerated at all about the intensity. I felt like Keanu Reeves was driving the bus directly through the living room.

When Nightmare on Elm Street started, I whispered, "I'm not much of a horror flick girl."

Nick looked at me, "No?"

I shook my head.

"You wanna watch something else?"

"I'll be okay."

Nick put his arm up on the couch behind me. "C'mere," he said, motioning for me to inch closer. I did. He dropped his arm so that it was draped over my shoulder. "I'll keep ya safe," he said in a low, sultry voice. "Don't worry."

I think my heart about stopped.

He leaned closer, "You know... They call the movie Nightmare on Elm Street, but the street name is never shown or mentioned during the whole movie other than when they show the logo in the credits."

I laughed, "Really?"

He nodded. And the trival facts kept coming. He seemed to know everything about the film - from bottomless bath tub trivia to random cross-references made with other horror films. "That glove effect was made with a car battery," he said at one point. "That noise is a steak knife on the bottom of a metal chair."

Nick laughed when I screamed and hid my face in his shoulder. His arm tightened around my shoulder. He smelled heavenly. I closed my eyes, not wanting the scary scene to end so that I could just stay where I was, breathing him in. I could hear his heart beat.

"You can look up now," he said thickly after a few moments.

I pulled away, reluctantly.

"You're funny," he said, smirking. "I gotta watch scary movies with you more often," he joked.

"You're mean," I said, my voice husky, my face only inches from his.

"Very," he whispered.

Our eyes were connected. My heart was pounding, my skin getting hotter as he cleaned closer... Oh Christ, I thought. He was going to kiss me...

And then the bloody phone rang.

Chapter Twenty


I didn't move. Even after Nick had pulled back, leaped up out of the couch area, and hovered behind me with his phone to his ear, I still lingered, still waiting, dreaming that somehow the moment would be returned to once he was done with the phone. Our lips had been so close to touching that I could feel the aura of his presence, the static electricity moving between the surface of my mouth and the surface of his. I had been breathing his breath.

When I finally convinced myself that he wasn't going to magically reappear, I glanced back at him. He was pacing nervously in front of the double french doors that led out into the backyard. I could see through them that the moon was shining off the swimming pool and the ocean beyond that. I wondered whether he'd ever seen and really fully appreciated the beauty of the view his home afforded him. Nick caught my eyes and he moved the phone from his face and mouthed it's Cora.

Figures.

I got up and picked up his empty KFC bucket and the two empty bottles of soda pop. The Red Vines were halfway gone, the popcorn mostly gone. I carried everything out to the kitchen as Nick's voice echoed around the house. I was cleaning up the mess in the kitchen when Nick appeared in the door way. "I have a favor to ask you," he said.

"What's that?" I asked.

He licked his lips, "So your, uh, your friend - the one that's gonna dance at the party?"

"Addison," I supplied.

Nick nodded, "Yeah, her. Would she be interested in auditioning to open for Cora?" he asked.

"I think she'd sell her soul to the devil to audition for Cora," I replied, "And that may be understating it."

Nick laughed, "Well here's the thing... Cora's really in desperate need and she's frustrated right now. I guess a lot of the people auditioning for her right now really suck. So... she was just asking if I knew anybody... and I told her about your friend."

"Addison's gonna shit," I said.

"Here's the thing." Nick tapped his fingers together. "Cora's doing the auditions now." He stared at me.

I paused. "So you need Addison now is what you're saying."

Nick nodded.

I scrambled for my phone. Addie was going to have a panic attack not being able to prepare, I thought, but she'd kill me if she didn't get to have this opportunity. I quickly thumbed out her phone number and waited.

"Addison's phone," a squeaky young voice answered.

"Hey, who's this?"

"I'm Meghan," came the reply, "Addison's on stage." She laughed.

"When she gets off stage tell her to call Sam, okay? Tell her it's vitally important and that I'm on my way over." I hung up on Meghan and turned to Nick. "She's at work. I'll have to go get her."

Nick grabbed a set of keys off the counter. "C'mon, I'll drive."

"Should you bring Cora's purse?" I suggested.

Nick glanced at it. "Nawh. She can come get it herself."

I realized after we were already on the highway and Nick's terrible driving was terrifying me once more that I should've insisted I drove. I clutched the arm rest with white knuckles once again, and Nick laughed at my fear. We made it to the club where Addison worked in record time. Either Meghan had forgotten to mention my call to Addie or she wasn't off stage yet because she hadn't called. Nick parked out front and we climbed out of the car. A valet ran over offering to take Nick's keys. "We aren't staying, just picking someone up," he waved the valet off. He turned to me. "I feel like I've been here before."

I laughed, "Not while Addison's working. I hear about every celebrity that graces these hallowed halls when she's working." I stared up at the sign. I hated coming here, to be honest, because as much as Addison loved it and as much as I joked about it I hated that Addison was a stripper. I hated that she so willingly gave herself away like that. I took a deep breath.

"Are we going in?" Nick asked.

I nodded, and stepped forward. At the door, we were both IDed and I shouted over loudly thumping music that I was here to talk to Addison and they checked a list and found me on it, then waved me through a VIP door. Nick lingered at the door leading into the club, staring out into the beams of colored light piercing the dark. I could hear Addison's voice echoing through the club as she sang. Nick hadn't noticed me turning into the backstage hallway, so I paused and went back for him. He was staring at the stage. I looked over. Addison was doing her thing, gyrating in a hot pink garter belt and thong - topless - at the edge of the stage with five inch heels that were an iradescent sort of silver, like disco balls on her feet. She held a microphone and was singing a cover of S&M by Rhianna.

"Shit," he muttered.

"That's Addison," I said.

Nick looked at me, wide eyed. "Well damn," he said.

I grabbed his elbow and pulled him away, not wanting to see anymore of Addison's act myself, and dragged him down the hall that led to the dressing rooms. When we stepped in a general squeal of surprise went through the girls as Nick followed me, and he covered his eyes politely, though I could see the motion killed him. I pulled him along by his hand over to Addison's booth. Her cell phone was on the counter and a ditzy nineteen year old grinned from the next booth over. "You must be Sam," she squeaked.

"You must be Meghan."

"Yeah, I'm Meghan." She grinned. She looked at Nick. "Is that --"

Nick held out his free hand, other hand still covering his eyes, "I'm Nick Carter." He was about a foot off from actually offering his hand to Meghan, so I pushed his hand toward her and she shook it, staring at him in awe.

"Addison should be off in a second," Meghan said as the song came to an end upstairs.

"Thanks," I answered. I pushed Nick into Addison's chair so he could sit and he leaned his elbow on the arm of it, resting his face in his palm.

A moment later, Addison came down the steps from the stage, her heels clicking on the cement, pulling on a silky robe. A chorus of "Good set Addie!" went up among the girls, and Addison laughed and thanked them and then her eyes landed on me... and Nick. Her eyes widened. She mouthed What the hell is he doing here? at me as she walked closer.

"Addison," I said.

Nick stuck out his arm wildly into the air around him, "Hey I'm Nick."

Addison stared at his hand, which was no where near her, and then moved so she could shake it, "Hey Nick... Hey Sam... What are you guys doing here?" she lingered on Nick's hand, staring down at it before she finally let it go.

"Cora's doing auditions," I said.

A couple girls necks almost twisted off as they turned at mention of the name Cora in conjunction with a word like auditions.

Addison stared at me, "You told me that already..."

"No," I said, "I mean now. Right now. We're here to pick you up."

Addison's jaw dropped. "But I -- I'm -- I'm at -- but -- What?"

Nick, eyes still closed, said, "She's been through a string of terrible auditions," he explained, "And Sam here told me about you and I told her that we'd bring you over. Please," he said, "It'd mean a lot to me if you'd come."

"But I haven't practiced anything for her, I haven't prepared, I'm... Well I'm kinda naked right now..." she looked down at her robe.

"Well get dressed," I said, turning to Addison's wardrobe of show clothes hanging next to her dresser, "Lord knows you've got a great selection of stuff here..."

Addison stared at me, her face pale. "But... I -- mental preparation..." she stammered.

Nick opened his eyes to look at Addison. A bunch of girls squealed as they saw his eyes open, and dove to take cover, but Nick's eyes were focused directly on Addison's eyes. I could see her melt under the intense blue of them. "You're going to do great," he said to her firmly, "I just saw you on stage, and I promise... you're going to do great."

Addison blinked, and I could tell by the expression on her face that he'd just completely turned her to mush.

I handed Addison a leotard and shirt combo that was very 80's but also very Addie and I knew she looked amazing in. "Here," I said. "Get dressed. Your big break is calling."

Chapter Twenty-One


We were in the car maybe a nano second, Nick in the driver seat, me in the passanger, and Addison leaning between the two from the back, and she kept giving me questioning glances. I knew what she wanted, but I couldn't say anything with Nick right there. I could tell Addison could feel the tension between Nick and I. Or maybe the tension I had toward Nick. I have no idea if he could feel it, too. For all I know, the almost kiss has been completely in my head...

The way Nick drove, we got to the dance studio in like fifteen minutes from the club where Addison worked. It looked like a giant warehouse, other than the wild assortment of wanna-be singers gathered with their guitars and crazy props under the dim orange glow of the parking lot lights.

Nick parked and we got out of the Escalade. Some people looked up and started talking amongst themselves as they spotted Nick. Fingers were pointed. Nick ignored them - or maybe he didn't even see them at all - and he led Addison and I across the lot and up to the bouncer that stood at the door. He nodded Nick, Addie and I through. By this point, Addison was literally shaking, clutching my hands with hers, her eyes teary. "Oh God," she was whispering, "Oh sweet Jesus, oh God. I'm gonna pass out. If I don't pass out it'll be some kind of miracle."

"You're gonna be okay, this is no different than any other performance," I said gently. "In fact, it'll be easier. You'll have clothes on." I smirked.

Addison shook her head, "It's harder with clothes on. They don't look at your face if your boobs are exposed."

Nick glanced back over his shoulder at this conversation and smirked. We'd arrived to a little waiting area and there was a huge picture glass window looking into the dance studio. Inside, I could see someone auditioning in front of a table where Cora, Hugh Walters, and, of all people, Justin "Z" Platt were sitting. Cora was laying languidly in her chair, her feet up and a pair of thick black sunglasses covering her eyes, her hair tucked into a carfully wound scarf. She seemed asleep and for all anyone could tell behind the dark lenses she could be.

As Nick pushed open the door and walked into the studio, Cora lowered her glasses and sat up, her eyes fixed on Nick's face. Her bright red lips parted, "Nick Carter," she said in a thick, half dreamy sort of voice, interrupting the poor girl still mid-audition. The girl stopped singing and stood there helplessly in the center of the room.

I wondered if it was awkward for Cora, being in one room with her husband and both of her secret lovers.

Hugh Walters stood up and for the first time I was able to fully appreciate the size of him. I mean he looks big in pictures, but they just don't do justice for just how big he really is. The guy towered over Nick like a skyscraper of mass proportions. You could fit three or four of Nick in him side by side for width, too. He was like a bear. He extended a balled fist to Nick and for one fleeting moment of irrationality, I thought he was gonna punch him. But then Nick balled his fist back and the two of them awkwardly bumped. You could feel the tension between them, and I wondered if Hugh suspected Nick and Cora, or if they just didn't get along so well completely aside from the affair.

"Hey," Nick said. "So you can stop auditions now... I got your girl right here." He waved a hand at Addison, "Meet the lovely, talent Miss. Addison."

I pushed Addie forward and she stumbled in her iridescent heels for just one step, then took a deep breath, and I literally watched her move into performance mode. She walked up to the table with an air of liquid confidence, struck out her hand, and announced, "Addison Mueller, but most people just call me Addie." She took Hugh Walters' hand and shook it firmly, then turned to Z and did the same. When she turned to Cora, she said, "You... are an inspiration."

Cora smiled, her red lips curling into a heart shape. "Why thank you," she said fluidly. She looked Addison over head to toe. "Who's your stylist?"

"I don't have one," Addison said, a bit of a confused tone to her voice.

Cora looked surprised, "Really?"

"I dress myself," Addison replied.

Cora looked at Hugh, "She's got great style," she said. And I wondered for a moment what it must be like to be so fucking famous that you don't even remember how to dress yourself in the morning.

"But can she sing?" Z asked.

"Oh she can sing," I replied.

Z looked at me and recognition lit up his face, "Pissed off, fiesty bagel girl," he said, pointing.

"Samantha," Nick corrected quickly.

I saw Cora's eyes flash between the two of them and then back at me. She clearly didn't like either one of them recognizing me in anyway. She glowered like a dark cloud, and put her sunglasses back on.

"Well let's see what you got then, Miss. Addie," Hugh said, waving away the poor girl who'd been mid-audition, "You're dismissed," he said to her. And she walked out, looking a bit deflated. "Go on then," Hugh said to Addison.

Addie looked at me and shoved her purse into my hands. "We didn't pick a song," she hissed under her breath as she did. "What do I do?"

"The classic, obviously," I answered, smiling.

Addison nodded. "Okay." She turned and scampered to the center of the room and I fell back.

"What's the classic?" Nick whispered.

"You'll see," I answered as Nick and I stepped to the side to get out of Cora, Hugh, and Z's line of sight.

Addison stood in the center of the room, took a deep breath, and announced, "I'm going to do this song by biggest idol... the queen of pop... This is my favorite song, and I feel like it really describes me," she grinned, and closed her eyes for a moment... washing her mental pallette. I'd seen her do this a thousand times.

She'd always introduced it the same way. Even when we were five years old and doing "rock concerts" from the picnic table benches in her backyard.

Cora sat forward and removed her sunglasses again. She looked intrigued. She probably thought that Addison was about to belt out one of her songs or something.

Addison filled her lungs and began:

"Some boys kiss me, some boys hug me -- I think they're ohhh-kaayy-aayy
If they don't give me propert credit, I'll just walk awayyy-ayyy"

And just like that, Addison snapped into true performance mode, and started dancing - moves that we'd made up forever ago that she still used in her shows at the club now and then. I felt tears spring to my eyes because once when we were twelve Addison had said to me that she'd be famous for singing this song one day, just like Madonna.

And she was so gonna be right.

"They can beg and they can plead, but they can't see the liii-iight..."

She slid her hand suggestively down the center of her torso as she sang,

"That's right."

She winked, then started walking toward the table, catlike, her eyes focused solely on Hugh...

"Cos the boy with cold hard cash is always Mr. Riii-iiight."

She flipped his tie with the tip of her hand as she cooed the words, then turned suddenly on her heels and made her way back to the center of the room where she pop locked and rolled out the chorus,

"Cos we are liiiiving in a material world and IIIIIIII am a material girl, you know that we are liiiiving in a material world and I am a material -- ooohhh material-al -- I am a material girl!"

She tossed her head back so that her sheet of long hair hung behind her like a curtain and threw out her arms, pushing her breasts forward. She looked like a human firework. Addison held the position as Hugh and Z both started clapping enthusiastically. Cora was smiling quietly at the end of the table.

I looked up at Nick, teary eyed. He smiled back at me. "You look so proud," he commented.

"I am," I choked, wiping my eyes.

Before anything was even said I knew all of Addison's dreams had just started coming true.

If only I'd known the ramifications of the moment, I might not've been so happy about it.

Chapter Twenty-Two


Nick grinned from the driver's seat as Addison talked a mile a minute in the back about how long she'd dreamed of this moment, how nice Cora and Hugh had been, and thanked him about a hundred thousand times for bringing her for the audition. "You're insanely, fucking incredible," she told him, slapping his shoulder, "I could fucking kiss you," she announced.

"It was no problem," Nick replied, hands firmly on the wheel.

Addison elbowed me and winked in a watch this kind of way. "So is it you or Hugh that I owe the blow job?" she asked Nick.

Nick choked and the car swerved as he recovered from his choking. I clutched the arm rest even harder. He laughed nervously, and I could tell the way his eys were shifting that he wasn't sure if he should joke back or let her know that no blow job was neccessary. He glanced in the mirror at her, but Addison's amazing deadpan expression gave him no clues. "I, uh --"

Addison laughed, "It's okay Nick. Sam can give it to you instead. I'm sure you'd prefer that anyway, right?" She winked at him in the mirror and I felt my face turn neon red. "I can tell you like my girl here. Are you single, Carter?" Addison rested her cheek on the side of my seat and smiled wickedly up at Nick, expecting an answer.

Nick muttered something incomprehensible.

Addison's eyes were sparkling.

Nick drove us back to his place to get my car. Addison got out and stared up at Nick's house. "Well fuck me," she announced, staring up at it, "This place is over the top. What the hell are you, the Great Gatsby?" she looked at Nick.

Nick laughed, "I dunno... maybe."

The irony of the question wasn't missed by me. Cora made the perfect Daisy. I wondered if Nick had ever read the book - or seen the movie at this point - and if he caught the irony behind Addison's question.

"I bet you have like a ball room and fifteen indoor swimming pools," Addison said, shaking her head. "You know what my place has? Indoor plumbing. The management company actually brags about there being a fully functioning bathroom in every unit." She laughed.

Nick smiled. "There's only one pool," he said.

"Is this where you're having your big party you've been making poor Sammy go crazy over?" Addison asked.

"Yeah. You wanna see the backyard? You might as well see where your debut concert's going to be held..." he winked at me and ushered us through the house - Addison oohing and aaahing all the way through it - and out the back french doors.

"Jesus, you own the ocean, too?" Addison joked as he led us down the steps.

Nick laughed. "I'm a big fan of the ocean," he said.

Addison stared out at it. "Gorgeous. So where's this stage I'm gonna be working on?"

"Well originally, I envisioned it spanned across the water here..." he waved his hands at the pool, "But if Hugh's gonna be involved there'll probably be a whole light and staging crew and I guess we'll put you up there." He waved back at the top of the staircase at the wide deck area.

Addison stared up at it, smiling.

On the way back to the club to get Addison's Vespa, she turned to me, "He's really nice; Nick is."

"Yeah, he is," I said.

"Did you see his face when I suggested you give him a blow job? He got all excited," she teased.

"He did not," I laughed.

Addison studied me a moment. "Something happened between you two tonight," she said, "Before you came to get me. Didn't it?"

I took a deep breath. "He almost kissed me."

"Tell me every single last bloody detail," Addison demanded.

And so I told her all about the movie night and the Nightmare on Elm Street trivia and the way he'd held me and how he'd smelled and the sound of his heart beat and the feeling of the aura of his lips. It was the last really great conversation that Addison and I had.

When I pulled up to the club, she got out and hovered in the window after closing the door. "Can you believe it?" she said, "A couple hours ago, I was on the stage in here thinking that I'd never go anywhere, never do anything, except exactly where I was and what I was doing." She shook her head. "Who knew, huh?"

"I did," I said. "I knew when we were five and we tied ribbons in our hair and wore leg warmers and stood on the bench of the picnic table out back. I knew then."

Addison smiled, "You're the only person in the world that's believed in me always, no matter what. You're the only one that's never stopped or given up on me." A tear slid across her face. "Even when I did, you didn't." She let go and turned and I watched her walk away and get on her bike.

I drove home thinking about Cora, Hugh, Z, Nick, and Addison and how convoluted and crazy my life had become in the last week. I didn't think, at that point, that it could get crazier. But I've learned since then that just when you think that, it gets so much crazier... almost instantly...

Prologue Part II


"You cannot tell anybody what I am about to tell you. Not ever. Do you understand me?"

The words echoed in my head... colors spun around me like being in a life-size kalidaescope... spinning, spinning... People came in and out of focus and the lights glowed off the surface of the water, the bubbles of the champagne danced in my vision, popping and hissing between faces and lights. I stumbled and caught hold of one of the dolphin shaped statues as a person rushed by me and cannon-balled into the pool.

I remember throwing up in the bushes.

"It's time you went home," said a voice, a familiar voice, though I never could figure out who it was. Someone that I'd met during the course of the night, perhaps, but I was tucked into a cab and the blurry mosaic of the party faded away into the hokah of the city of Los Angeles until I was home.

I landed on the bed face-down, the world still feeling as though it were spinning, everything fake and far off and dream like. I was haunted by the words he'd spoken in my ear, and I'd spent the night trying to best them, trying to rinse them from my mind. But I couldn't unhear what he'd said... couldn't undo what had already been done.

The headlines the next day were big and bold and proclaimed exactly what Nick had whispered in my ear.

I sat in bed, my head throbbing, staring down at the photograph until the image on the front page was burned into my mind, like staring at the sun for too long. When I closed my eyes, it still swam in front of me in a dozen different colors, spinning and swirling in my vision. Even then, when I couldn't escape it, I still couldn't believe it, still couldn't wrap my mind around what it was proclaiming. Surely, I thought, it had to be a mistake, surely they were wrong.

But the photograph was there to prove it...

Chapter Twenty-Three


The next morning, Addison had a meeting with Hugh Walters about a record deal. She texted me telling me that Hugh had called her first thing and she was on her way to the label's office downtown. I wished her good luck.

I did dishes out of nerves, waiting to hear from her how the meeting went, but when my phone finally rang it wasn't Addison telling me about her meeting, it was Nick.

"I need your help," he said.

"What's up?" I asked.

"Just come over, please," he said, "And hurry."

I left the soapy water in the sink and drove to Nick's, half expecting the mansion to be on fire from the urgency of his voice, but as I pulled up in the driveway there didn't seem to be even a blade of grass out of place. I parked behind his Escalade and went to the door and knocked, but there wasn't a response. I knocked harder, rang the bell twice, knocked again.

Just let yourself in and come upstairs, he texted.

I pushed open the front door of the house and headed for the stairs, running up them, my heart pounding. What could possibly be wrong that he couldn't come down stairs to answer the door? I wondered. "Nick?" I shouted as my feet hit the top landing.

"Down here... to your right..." he called.

I rushed down the hallway, passing even more awards and gold records and what not for the Backstreet Boys, which hung all over the walls. At the very end, a door stood open, light pouring out across the carpet.

I turned into the room to find a clothing apocalypse. It looked like Old Navy after a 50% off sale around Christmas time. I blinked in surprise. Every surface was covered with clothing, and even as I stood in the door way another shirt went flying across the room as Nick grumbled from the closet.

"What in hell happened in here?" I asked, looking around.

"I can't find anything to wear to the party," Nick said from the closet.

I looked around. "If you're looking for clothes in the closet, you might want to look at the floor instead..." I joked.

"Those are the rejects," he said.

"Is there anything left in there?" I bent down and scooped up a couple things and started folding them.

Nick sighed, "Not a lot. I need something to wear to the party. I need to look good. I need to look... dashing..." He turned to look at me. "What're you doing?"

"Folding the clothes."

He waved his hand, "I have a maid. She'll get it."

"You're gonna just leave all your clothes all over the floor for her?" I asked, raising my eyebrow.

"She has a specific way of hanging my stuff," he explained.

I stared at him as I scooped up the next armful of clothes and continued folding them. "I'm sure she appreciates you throwing it all over the floor then."

"Aw c'mon, I pay her ridiculously well to do what she does," he said, "It's not like she's imported from Mexico and payed thirty-two cents an hour." He sighed as I kept folding clothes and grabbed an armful himself. "She's just gonna unfold them to hang them," he argued as he started folding clothes clumsily. They looked more like messy balls than anything.

"It's easier to hang clothes when they're folded," I said.

Nick grumbled the entire time we were collecting and folding his stuff. We finally had everything folded up in neat-ish piles on the bed (well mine was anyways, Nick's was a teetering, tottering mess of semi-folded clothes, but at least he'd done it) and he looked over at me, "Are you happy now?"

"Yes."

"Now can we go get some new clothes for me to wear at the party? I need your help."

"I'm not sure what help I'm going to be," I replied, "Addison's way better at stuff like this than I am. Half the time she tells me what to wear."

"You can just look at stuff I try on and tell me when I look good," he replied.

I caught myself before I said something stupid like you always look good outloud.

Nick drove to an outdoor shopping complex that I'd only been two a couple times to window shop. Everything sold there was brand name by designers that were so fabulous and so expensive that I couldn't even pronounce more than half of them. One had actual people modeling the clothes in their window instead of mannequins. Imagine owning a brand so expensive that you could afford to hire a team of actual models to do nothing but stand in your mirror and move around in your clothes?

It became rapidly apparent that as clueless as I am about clothes, Nick was twelve times worse. It was like shopping with a five year old who'd never dressed himself before - you know, the ones that come downstairs in galoshes with their underwear on the outside of their pants and their shirts on their heads. Nick kept holding up terrible shirts. "I thought you wanted to look dashing?" I said, as he held up a t-shirt with the lyrics to some song splashed across it in neon colors.

"I do," Nick replied. "I dunno how to look dashing, though. What does dashing even imply?"

"It implies class," I said. "Which that shirt," I waved my finger at it, "Has none of."

Nick dropped it onto the shelf he'd pulled it from unceremoniously. "Okay so show me dashing." I pulled him out of that store and down the street. "Where are we going?" he asked as he trotted along beside me.

"Dashing," I said, spotting what I was looking for and pulling him over, "Means a suit." He made a face as I pulled him into a store stocked with suits and ties and button up shirts. I pulled him through the racks. I pulled out a dark blue suitcoat and held it up to him. He stood there obligingly as I shook my head and put it back on the rack.

"Did you see how she sat up and took of her glasses yesterday?" Nick asked, "At the auditions? When I walked in? She looked happy to see me, don't you think?"

She'd looked nervous that he, Z, and Hugh were in the same room, that's what I thought, but I could tell this meant a lot to Nick, so I said, "Yeah, she did," instead of what I actually wanted to say.

Nick smiled. "That's why I need to look really, really good at the party," he said. "I know she's going to look ballistically amazing, you know, and I don't wanna be like all blah and plain and boring when she does..."

I held an oatmeal colored jacket up to his chest, then put it down. "If she really loves you, she won't care what you're wearing at the party," I said. I picked up a charcoal grey jacket and held it up to him.

"This one's soft," he said, running his hand over the fabric.

"Here," I handed it to him, "What size pants?" I looked at the pants that went with the jacket and he pointed out his size and I grabbed a pair. I led the way to a huge wall of pigeon hole displays of shirts in various bright hues and started matching the jacket up.

"Do you think she loves me, then?" Nick asked.

"What?"

"Cora, do you think she loves me? From what you've seen?" he looked at me with hope in his eyes.

"Hasn't she told you she loves you?" I asked, trying to weasle my way out of answering the question.

Nick shrugged, "I dunno. No, not really. I mean," he sighed. "I dunno. She's married, you know? Sometimes, I feel like I annoy her..." He paused. "She never sticks around after we have sex. She's always in such a rush, you know? She's afraid she's gonna get caught."

"Like a guy leaving a one night stand," I said, remembering how she'd treated him at the hotel the night we met.

Nick stared at me.

"I mean that's what you just described," I supplied.

"She's just worried Hugh will find out or something," he said, shaking his head.

"Yeah," I said. I grabbed a dark blue and black striped shirt and handed it to him. He stared down at it, and I could see the way he was looking at it that what I'd said was bothering him. Part of me wanted to backtrack, to take it back and make it bettter, but another part of me was glad that maybe he'd analyze my words and realize what he had with Cora was superficial. "You should go try those on," I suggested. "We'll see if you're dashing in them." I smiled.

He nodded and headed for the dressing room.

He took an inordinate amount of time in the dressing room. When he came out he had a determined look on his face that accented the suit in a way that made him look like he was James Bond or something. I clapped my hands as he walked down the length of the dressing area to show me how he looked, one hand in his pocket, the other tucked under the jacket at his chest. "Well?" he said, coming to a stop.

I smiled, "Dashing."

He laughed and shook his head, "You've got a real talent for making and breaking a guy, Miss. Samantha." A tenative smile spread across his face. "Maybe we should get a few outfits together," he suggested, "I plan on wooing Cora more than the once..." he paused.

I nodded.

He went back and changed and we went back through the racks. I selected a white suit and a brown suit and an assortment of shirts. A couple pairs of shoes, belts, and a package of dorky hand-kerchiefs that Nick insisted was part of the dashing look, and his credit card bill was docked more than two months of my rent cost and he didn't even bat an eye.

When we got outside, he paused on the sidewalk, staring up at the sun, squinting. I held his bags in my fist as we stood there. He took a deep breath, then looked at me. "I'm not just a one night stand kinda guy anymore," he said. He licked his lips, "I don't wanna just fuck anyone that crosses my path. I went through that, I've been in the seedy hotels and the bathroom stalls and backs of limousines." He paused, shook his head. "I'm done fucking around. I've grown up a lot. I want to love now."

I nodded.

He looked at me. "I really love Cora. I'm not just fucking her, it's not about the sex. There's something about her... She's beautiful to me, you know? Like her soul." He shrugged. "Maybe nobody else can see it, I don't know. But I see it."

"I believe you," I said.

"I just don't want you to think this is all about sex," he explained. "She's more than that to me."

"I know she is," I answered. I hesitated because I felt bad hurting him like this, but I knew it was something that he needed to hear. "But are you more than that to her?"

Chapter Twenty-Four


"So where do you want to go?" Nick asked, breaking the silence that had fallen after I'd asked what he thought he was to Cora. He hadn't answered, but he'd really thought about it, and that was really all I could ask of him.

I shook my head, "I'm good."

"There ain't nothin' you wanna look at?" he asked, surprised.

I shook my head, "I'm good." He raised his eyebrow. "I'm not big on shopping," I offered by way of an explanation.

Nick studied me a moment. "Is it about money?" he asked.

It was. I mean I had fifty-K from working with him, obviously, but I've never had that kind of money before and to be honest I'd pretty much budgeted it out so that I'd be covered for awhile with rent and food. I was stingy because I'd gone too long without money to be able to let it pass between my fingers lightly. But I wasn't about to admit that to him. "I'm good," I insisted.

Nick rubbed his chin, "Hmmm," he mumbled, "Well I think you need a uniform anyways," he announced.

It was my turn to raise my eyebrow. "A uniform, huh?"

He nodded, "Yeah. For the party. You know. I'm going to be all dashing and stuff, the last thing I need is my personal assistant running around wearing some boring old thing... You need a uniform. Something that compliments dashing." He smirked. The words were cocky, the tone was not. He held up his wallet as he spoke, shaking it to make a point, "Company expense."

"What company?"

"Nick Inc," he replied. "It's a big corporation."

"Uh huh."

"I'm CEO. And founder. Well, no I guess my parents would be founders."

"Conceivers."

Nick shuddered. "Don't really wanna think about that."

"No?"

"Not even a little bit," he replied, laughing. He sized me up as we walked, "Maybe we could get you some assless chaps."

I swung one of his bags at him, lobbing him in the back of the legs with it. He laughed and danced out of the way. "Vicious!" he shouted, "You're abusive!" He grinned. "We better make them leather assless chaps, to match the BDSM spirit you've got going on."

"Shut up," I laughed. "You and your obsession with my ass... I hate you for looking at it."

"Like you didn't know I'd look when you turned around," he rolled his eyes. "Please." Nick's eyes widened and he stared at me, head tilted, "Why... Samantha Catherine Roades, you did know I'd look at your perfect little ass when you turned around, didn't you? You were trying to seduce me!" He shook his head, "You were taking advantage of me in my drunken state!"

"Seduce you?" I cried, "Please. You wish."

Nick chuckled, but he didn't reply. Instead, he grabbed my elbow and firmly led me into a shop with a bunch of exotic, fancy looking dresses in the window. "C'mon," he said, "It's my turn to pick out shit for you to wear." He grinned as he yanked me in the door.

Now here's an FYI: I hate dresses. I hate them. My mother used to put me in them every day when I was a kid, and all I wanted in my entire childhood was a good ol' pair of blue jeans but Heaven forbid a girl wear pants in my mother's household. I was a tomboy captured in the world of endless tea parties. I used to poison my teddy bears by imagining someone had put drano in their tea. My mother called me deranged, I called me smothered.

I followed Nick through the racks of filly, sparkley, lacey frocks that filled the shop almost to bursting. He'd pause and hesitate every now and then beside a mannequin and study the dress it wore, then look at me and shake his head and move on. He hummed tunelessly as he walked, a man on a mission.

"Nick, c'mon," I said, stopping by a violet dress with tassles all over it like a 20s flapper girl that he was studying. "I'm not pretty enough for any of this stuff, let's just go."

"What?" He turned and looked at me.

I shoved my glasses up my nose again - they'd chosen the most excellent moment to fall and demonstrate their obnoxiousness - and said, "I'm not pretty enough for --"

Nick held up his hand, cutting me off, and reached for my glasses. He lifted them off my ears and he disappeared in a blurry haze. I stared up at him, trying to keep him in focus, but he was a vague shape of color before me. He leaned closer and said in a deep, throaty, breathy sort of voice, "You're gorgeous... Like a classic film star... You've got these... beautiful, full lips... and this hair..." He lifted one hand to the side of my face... slid it along my jaw, cupped my cheek... "And those.... those eyes...." He was quiet... and so close...

"Can I help you?"

Nick slipped my glasses back on and by the time I'd adjusted to the clarity of vision an the end of the moment, he'd already turned to the sales clerk that'd walked up. FUCK YOU SALES CLERK! my heart bellowed from in my chest. I couldn't believe we'd been so close - again! - and been interrupted for something as stupid as a freaking sales clerk!

Nick waved an arm back at me, "I need to see every dress that you have in the entire store that would fit the absolutely beautiful Miss. Samantha here."

The clerk looked at me. "Size eight, dear?"

"Six," I mumbled.

"You'll be an eight here, we run small." She turned and disappeared.

Nick looked at me. I could still barely breathe, and with his eyes aimed at me I felt like I could breathe even less. He was like visual asthma. He smiled, "I think you'll look beautiful in something green. It's my favorite color, you know."

"Is it?" I asked.

He nodded. "It'll match your eyes."

My mouth was dry.

The clerk came back a moment later with a rack full of size eight dresses and Nick started picking through them. I hung back. "What's the occasion?" asked the clerk.

"Party," Nick replied, "A big party..." Then he grinned, "Ahh... there it is." He stepped back and held aloft an emerald colored dress, form fitting, with satin bodice and rouched skirt that would hug the hips and cut short in the region of the midthigh. He turned and held it out to me. "Go put this one on," he said.

I took it. "I dunno..."

"I put on your stupid suit."

"The suit made you look dashing."

"You'll look dashing in that," he said, waving his hands at it.

"Girls don't look dashing."

"Whatever the hell girls look that's like dashing then," he said. "Goooo try it onnnnn!"

The clerk smiled, "Come with me," she said eagerly and she dragged me off to this curtained off room to the left. Nick plopped himself down on a bench as the clerk put the dress on a hook in the room and smiled, "Let me know if you need help with the zipper, dear," she said and she yanked the curtain closed as she backed away.

I swallowed and slowly undid my jeans. I shimmied the dress on and struggled to reach behind me, but, determined, I got the zipper all by myself. And then I looked in the mirror. My jaw dropped.

I couldn't believe it was me I was seeing. At least not from the neck down. The dress cupped my boobs just right and hugged my curves in a way that they'd never been hugged before and made my booty pop and my legs looked longer and leaner than I'd ever thought they could. I was floored. The tag was hanging over one of my boobs and I went to tuck it in and caught sight of the price.

"Holy mother of Jehosephat!" I shouted.

"Everything okay?" Nick called.

"It looks like shit," I lied. No way in hell was that price for real. No way in Hell.

The curtain suddenly was pulled back and Nick stepped in, letting it fall back in place behind him. I squealed and jumped back, tripping over my jeans on the floor and hitting the wall. Nick sized me up. "Holy fuck," he said. "You look..." He stared at me. "Wow."

I stared up at him. "Nawh," I said.

He nodded, "Yeah," he answered. He pulled open the curtain. "We'll take that one, the one she's got on," he announced to the clerk.

"But Nick, wait --" I said, I reached into the bodice and pulled out the price tag, "Nick --"

The clerk came over and snapped the tag off my boob. "Can I get you anything else sir? Maybe a bag or some shoes to go with it for the pretty lady?"

"Yes, let's see what you've got," Nick announced, waving me to follow him.

"Nick -" I squeaked, and I hurried after him and the clerk in my stocking feet - my sneakers and clothes left in the dressing room - "Nick..." I grabbed his elbow and pulled him closer. "It's a thousand dollars," I hissed.

He shrugged.

"Nick! A thousand dollars," I tried again.

He grinned, "Sam... I don't care," he said. "C'mon. We're looking at shoes."

I stared at him, dumbfounded.

"Seriously Sam..." he laughed, "You look like a million dollars in that thing. I'm getting a bargain." And he pulled me along to where the clerk was holding aloft a pair of flats that sparkled like they were made of pure gold.

And I had a feeling they probably had a price tag like they were, too.

Chapter Twenty-Five


When I got home from shopping with Nick, I tried calling Addison. I knew she'd want to hear all about the trip and the dress and probably even want to come over and see it. But she didn't answer her phone, so I left a message telling her it was important and to call me when she got a chance. I waited, listening to a CD and cleaning the house. When she finally called me back it was to say that they'd signed a contract and she was already in the studio learning a new song and singing back-up vocals for Cora. "I'll call you back later, okay?" she said, excited, "I have so much to tell you about!" And before I could even reply, she'd already hung up.

I laid on the couch waiting for her to call back. I read a book and made a couple more plans for Nick's big party, and I remember seeing midnight come and go before I fell asleep... but Addison hadn't called.

When the phone did ring, it wasn't Addie -- it was Nick. And it was two-fifteen in the morning. I squinted at the time on my phone before answering. "Hmm?" I hummed into the phone, barely awake.

"Sam?" Nick's voice was tight.

"Hmm?"

"I know it's late... but..." he paused.

"You already have condoms," I mumbled into the phone.

He didn't laugh. "I just... need to talk."

This roused me. "To talk?" I asked. I struggled to sit up. The couch tried to resist letting me.

"Yeah."

I suddenly realized Nick's voice wasn't just tight - it was pinched. It was sad. It was broken. My heart raced. "What's wrong?" I asked.

He sniffed... a whimper escaped him.

"I'm on my way," I said.

"No, no," he choked, "No, I'll come to you. I gotta get outta this... this fucking house..."

"Are you sure?"

"Yeah. I'll be there in ten." He hung up.

I got up and paced the room, sick to my stomach, my nerve endings firing off so that my skin tingled. My adrenaline had officially kicked in and I was awake like it was midday. I kept peering out the window, waiting to see his headlights cut the night. It seemed to take forever - and this worried me even more because I knew how he drove - but finally the Escalade pulled up out front and he texted me. I'm here, come out, I wanna ride.

I grabbed my purse and my keys and locked my door and ran across the driveway to the Escalade. I leaped in and pulled my seatbelt across my chest. Nick was sitting stiffly in the driver's seat, his arms out in front of him, clutching the wheel with tightly balled fists. He barely even glanced over as I got in the car, and I hadn't even finished clicking in my buckle when his foot jabbed the gas and the Escalade shot away from the curb.

I assumed my usual position of clutching the arm rest.

"What's the matter?" I asked him.

"I just needed to get out," he answered, his voice wobbled.

The headlights cut through the night, scenery flying by. Nick flicked his blinker on and we turned down a side road. A cat only just got out of the street in time. Within moments we were on the interstate headed northwest toward the coast. I stared at him, trying to ignore the fact that the spedometer was reading over 80 miles per hour and climbing, and I realized that he was trying desperately not to cry.

"What happened?" I asked.

He took a deep breath as he merged from one interstate to the next. I was amazed that we hadn't been pulled over. It was just a matter of time, I thought, as the Escalade shot down the road. Nick exhaled shakily. "I called Cora, reminded her of her purse being at my place. I wanted to see her... I wanted to - to talk to her, about... about what you said today."

We were coming up behind another car. Not only caught up but passed it in a matter of moments, the headlights fading in the dark behind us.

"And?" I asked.

Nick's voice was strangled, "She doesn't want to see me," he said. "She thinks we need to take a break."

"A break?"

"Yeah," he said, "She thinks --" he shook his head. "Fucking hell, Sam, why the fuck doesn't anyone love me?" And there they were - the tears. Big, fat, wet things that travelled across his cheeks and curved over the line of his jaw.

"Nick..."

The spedometer broke 100mph.

"Nick, you need to pull over." He punched the wheel with his palm as he choked out a sob, his face crumpled. I glanced between him and the road. "Please, Nick. Pull over."

He did. Thankfully. He slowed down and pulled the wheel shockingly sharply so that we crossed all four lines to the shoulder and the tires screeched to a stop. He threw the Escalade into park and cars rushed by us with shwwoops of sound. He covered his face with his palms.

"Sweetie..." I undid my buckle and turned in my seat, leaning over across the center console... my intention had been to hug him, but before I could even touch him, he shot from me like shrapnel, got out of the car and slammed the door. He walked around the nose of the Escalade and over to the guard rail, where he leaned over and heaved. "Oh man," I sighed, pushing my door open to join him on the side of the road where he was throwing up.

I walked over and rubbed his back as he leaned over the guard rail, spit falling away from his mouth like the loose strands of a spider web in the wind. His eyes were closed and he was panting. I felt like punching the crap out of Cora for hurting him like this, for putting him through hell. I ran my hand down his spine. "Nick," I whispered, "Anyone that would hurt you this badly...isn't worth being hurt this badly over."

"You don't know what you're saying," he choked. "You don't know her."

"Maybe you don't know her," I said.

It sounded worse than I'd meant it to sound.

Nick stood upright. "Maybe she's right about you!" he yelled, smacking my hand away from his back. "Maybe she's right, maybe you are after me. Maybe it's not a joke." His voice climbed, "She thinks I'm fucking you behind her back, you know that? That's what she said. I told her I'm not, I told her that you don't mean anything to me, but she doesn't believe me. She wanted me to fire you! And maybe I should! Maybe I should if you're gonna stand here and judge me for loving her when you don't even know her and how incredible she is."

"Maybe you should!" I shouted.

Nick stared at me, glowered at me even. He turned away. "Fuck!" he screamed out into the dark. "Fuck!"

"Stop screaming," I yelled, "The world isn't gonna get any better just because you cussed it out. Only you can make shit better. And don't you dare tell me that I don't mean anything to you because that's bullshit! If I didn't mean anything to you, you wouldn't have called me just now to talk to you about all this!"

He turned on his heels and glared at me, "You don't mean anything to me! You were a fucking housemaid in a hotel that knew too much, that's all you were. You're a glorified slave."

"Fuck you!" I yelled. "You and your cocky attitude!"

"I've earned being cocky!" he shouted. "I've worked harder than hell to be where I am."

"That doesn't mean you have to be a prick!" I said.

"If I'm such a prick then why do you like me?"

"I'm asking myself that right this instant!!!!" I screamed.

We stared at each other, both of us trying to outlast the other. Cars continued to fly by, his chest heaved as he panted still, my fists were balled. Our eyes bore holes into each other. It was the longest stare down I've ever been a part of... and the most intense moment of my life.

That is, until the one that followed it.

Suddenly, Nick swept forward and his mouth was on mine and he pressed me against the hood of the still-running Escalade, his hands slid across my backside, pulled me closer to him so that our bodies were smeared against eachother so tightly I could almost feel his heart beating in my chest. Headlights streamed by fluidly as Nick's hand slid up my spine, supporting my back. I melted against him, bending where he bent like butter being pressed by a hot spoon.

When he broke the kiss, my head was aimed upward, toward the stars that peeked out over the tree tops in the thick velvet night sky. He stood there and stared at me and breathed loudly. I stared back, my heart racing from my throat it seemed.

"Well shit," he whispered, voice shaking, and he walked around the Escalade and got back in the driver's side without another word.

Chapter Twenty-Six


I opened the Escalade door and got inside. Nick was sitting there, fist balled and biting his knuckles, staring at the wheel in silence. I slid my seat belt across my chest calmly and stared straight ahead. A million thoughts were going through my head. I glanced over at him. He still hadn't moved. I wondered what he was thinking.

I cleared my throat.

He looked up at me.

"What was that?" I asked.

He lowered his fist from his mouth. "I... was hoping that... if I did it... if I kissed you... that..." he paused. "I was hoping I wouldn't... feel... anything."

I nodded slowly. "And?"

Nick stared at me like I was a dangerous object he was being threatened by. "...I did."

"You did?"

"I did." He paused. "Didn't you?"

"It doesn't matter if I did or not," I answered.

"But did you?"

I nodded.

Nick took a deep breath. He stared out the window at the hood of the Escalade. I stared, too. Mostly because I felt like I should, not because I felt like I had to. "What does this mean?" he asked quietly.

"I don't know," I replied. "Does it mean anything?"

"It must mean something," he said.

I stared ahead. I didn't know what to say. My palms were sweating and I couldn't quite wrap my mind around what he was saying, what was happening, what the kiss and these words all meant about what tomorrow would hold. My throat ached with desire to say what I was thinking it meant, what I wanted it to mean, but I didn't dare to speak.

He turned the key in the ignition and started driving - at a much more normal speed now - and we just sat in silence, neither of us daring to look at the other. He took the next exit and turned around and the city lay before us, glowing in the night and obliterating the stars. It was nearly four in the morning by the time Nick pulled up in my driveway. We sat there again in silence for a long moment.

"I don't wanna go home," he said thickly.

"Come inside," I replied.

He followed me to the door of the house, and I pushed it open and we walked in and Nick looked around as I closed and locked it behind us. I turned from the door, leaned against it, watched him stand there in the center of the dining room-living room area. He turned around and looked at me. He walked over and put a hand flat against the door, cornering me in, and he stared into my eyes. I stared right back.

Nick leaned forward and kissed my forehead softly.

A shiver shot up my spine. I trembled under his lips. He smiled and shifted his trajectory, kissing my mouth, softly and sweetly. He pressed his other hand against the door so I was boxed between his palms, like he was doing a push up around me. I just stood there, feeling his presence. He pulled away and he stared into my eyes again for a long moment.

"You're... intoxicating," he whispered.

"Am I?"

"I've never... felt like this before. I don't know what this is."

I shrugged, "I don't know what you're feeling."

"I feel... reckless..." he said quietly.

He closed his eyes, just inches from me, and I stared at the feathery texture of his eyelashes as they rested against the skin beneath his eyes, and when he reopened them, I was staring into the mystically deep blue of them.

"I see you," I whispered.

Nick put his hands on me. On my hips. He pulled me closer, slipping his fingers through my belt loops and holding me steady. He turned me gently, never breaking our eye contact. As though my instinct, he led me through the house to my bedroom, and he leaned into me all the way until I was laying across the bed, my blonde hair flying out around me, and our mouths touched as he lay over me. "Wait..." I said, "Wait..." And he rolled off of me. "Wait here just one second," I said.

Nick watched as I got up and left the room. I went to the bathroom where my good lingerie was in a laundry basket in the closet and I pulled out a hot pink bra and matching panty set and slid them on and ran a razor over my legs real quick. I lathered my skin with moisturizer and spitzed with a light raspberry body mist. I brushed my teeth. As I brushed, I stared into my own eyes in the mirror. Was this a good idea? I wondered. Or was I setting myself up for heartbreak by allowing him to come here like this, in a hurricane of emotion and self-admitted recklessness? But I wanted it so bad, I thought to myself, I could feel it already, even as I stood there. My body ached for it tonight, like my heart ached for him, for a connection... But did I want it like this?

I went back, my heart pounding, and I leaned against the door frame.

Nick looked up from the bed.

I'd half expected him to have been on the phone with Cora when I returned. Half expected the moment to be ruined by my pause in the action, half thought that I'd ruin it by over thinking or whatever. But he wasn't on the phone, and the moment was only perfected when he whispered, "Wow."

"I have three rules," I said lowly.

Nick looked at me expectantly.

"Number one," I said slowly, "If I sleep with you, I can't be just another girl you've fucked. I can't be just one of a nameless stream of women that you've been with. Do you understand me?"

Nick nodded.

"Number two," I said, "If I sleep with you, I can't just be a rebound because Cora hurt you tonight. I can't just be something you do because what you want to do isn't available. Do you understand me?"

He nodded again.

"And number three," I said, "If I sleep with you, it's going to be slow... one step at a time... This is love, not fucking. And if that's not true, then it needs to stop. Right now." Nick stared up at me as I walked across the room until I stood at the edge of the bed directly between his knees, staring down at him as he sat there, eye level with my breasts, staring up at me. "Do you understand me?" I whispered.

He nodded.

I ran my hands through his hair, his head tilted back and he closed his eyes and just felt my touch. I grinned down at him. "Okay," I said gently, "You call the shots from here, Carter... Just play by the rules."

"I will," he promised.

Chapter Twenty-Seven


Nick pulled me down onto the bed gently, and we crawled across, pulling the sheets and blankets over us to our waists. He kicked off his jeans and tugged away his shirt, and lay there in his boxers. He stared at me, right into my eyes, and I reached for him, running my palms across his chest. He radiated warmth and I liked feeling his body rise and fall as he breathed, like physical proof that he was really there. He slid his hand over the curve of my hip, onto the small of my back, and pulled me closer to him so that our pelvic bones touched and I aligned with him, my back curved so that I continued to look up at his eyes.

I could see emotion running through him, and his face moved with it, the corners of his mouth twitched. He whispered, "Samantha..."

And I knew it wasn't going to happen.

"Yes?" I whispered.

Nick took a deep breath, "Can I just hold you tonight?" he asked. "Cos I think, to be fair, to play by the rules, I think we should wait." I could see how much he didn't want to say these words - it was written plainly on his face. "I want to have sex with you right now," he explained, "But I -- I don't want it to be because I'm hurt. I respect you enough to wait. Is that okay?"

I nodded.

"But don't go anywhere, okay? Please?" He snaked his arms tighter around me, until I curled around him, laying my head on his chest. I wrapped one leg around his waist and snuggled so that I fit in the crook of his arm. He rested his jaw on the top of my head and let out a contented sigh, his hand absently rubbing a rhythm against my back. "This is the least alone I've felt in years," he muttered.

I kissed his chest softly, my palm pressed against his skin by my face.

"I don't mean to be a prick," he said quietly, as though I were only just now screaming the words I'd screamed back on the interstate what already seemed like a lifetime ago. "Sometimes I don't realize what an ass I'm being until someone says so. And then I feel like shit after and wish I could take it all back but it's too late. You know?"

"You've got a temper on you," I commented.

He nodded. "I really do. I inherited that from my mom. She's such an emotionally charged person... I mean, all my family is." He lay there quiet for a moment, and I listened to his breath and heart beat. His words seemed to echo in his chest, like I was hearing them from inside and outside of him at the same time.

"My family was never emotional enough," I confessed.

"Family is a weird concept... how people relate to eachother, charged and connected by blood... expected to get along and cooperate even if their personalities are chasms apart..." Nick shook his head, "Even when they've burned you to hell and back again, you have to forgive them... Blood is thicker than water... blah, blah, blah..." He paused. "I don't think my family will ever forgive me for the things I've done. And maybe they shouldn't, I don't know. I've been a real asshole for a long time, you know?"

"My brother won't forgive me until I let Jesus forgive me," I laughed. "All he does is preach, preach, preach about forgiveness and how much it means, but he never shows what it looks like." I closed my eyes. "I didn't even do what he thinks I did," I mumbled.

"What does he think you did?" Nick asked.

"Subconciously, I think he blames me that our parents are dead," I answered.

"You said it was a car wreck... because of a deer," he said. I was surprised he remembered us talking about it considering he'd been drunk and icing a black eye that night. "Head on with an eighteen wheeler, you said. How could that possibly be your fault?"

"I was in the car," I said. I saw it in flashes in my mind. "It was pouring rain and I'd undone my belt buckle because I'd dropped my CD player. I was in my moody teenage years, you know? I'd spent the entire ride under my headphones ignoring them. I was bent forward and the deer came out and she swerved and on the impact I was thrown out of the car and onto the grass. I walked away with a bruised tailbone and some cuts from the glass I flew through. Nick, even my fucking CD player was still running. But my parents were dead." I felt a tear run from my eye, across my cheek, and hit his skin.

He held me tighter. "That isn't your fault... and I for one am damn thankful you were spared. It just... wasn't your time."

"Jake blames me," I said.

"Aaron blames me for Leslie dying," he said.

"Your sister died?" I twisted my neck to look up at him.

"Last year," he said thickly.

"I didn't know that," I whispered.

"Prescription medication overdose. But she was depressed for years and years. Because of how fucked up my family is and everything. But Aaron thought I should've been able to help her somehow, like I was a miracle working god that could cure peoples' problems, just because I'd managed to pull myself out of the same hole that she was stuck in... I don't know how I did it really, I don't know how I could've helped her. And maybe Aaron's right and I should've. Maybe that's why I feel so guilty about her being gone. But he blames me, right or wrong, and it breaks every fiber of me to know that I didn't just lose one sibling when she died, I lost them all. I lost my whole family."

"That's how I felt about Jake with my parents. They weren't the only ones who died. So did the Jake I knew before."

We fell silent for a long moment, both of us just laying there in the dark. Outside the window, the sun was starting to light up the sky in streaks from the east, turning the world a lavender-grey color.

Nick chuckled.

"What is it?" I asked.

"I've spent all of my life fighting just to be seen. I've climbed obstacles nobody thought I could've done for recognition and fought for fame and thrown myself into hell for notoriety when nothing else worked... I've spent thirty-three years obsessed with the limelight, obsessed with the imaginary promise that being seen meant being understood. And you..." he laughed, "You just walk in and I don't even try with you, I don't even think about it... and you just see me, naturally." He shook his head, "It's ironic, isn't it, how hard I tried and how easy you saw me when I wasn't trying?"

"Maybe you've been trying too hard all along," I suggested.

"Maybe," he agreed. "I just know I'm real tired of trying so hard."

"So rest," I said.

"I think I will," he answered.

"Good. I like you better this way anyhow," I said, and Nick hugged me tighter in response.

Chapter Twenty-Eight


I didn't dare to open my eyes. I'd been laying there in bed, conscious, for what felt like a century, pep-talking myself for the sight of an empty room. It'd been a dream, I told myself, or worse, I'd been a one-night stand gone wrong, a plot to seek revenge on Cora. I took a deep breath, and finally, finally allowed my eyelids to part, staring up at the ceiling. I turned my head slowly.

Not only was he stil lthere, but the sight of him took my breath away. It was like looking on a god, fallen from the sky. He lay there, the sheets around his waist, the sun streaming from the window shining across the topography of his physique, his bare torso exposed completely, arms up on the pillow, folded over his head. Even his arm pits were sexy, I thought in amazement. I'd never seen sexy arm pits before, but there they were.

"Oh God this is dangerous," I whispered to myself as I stared at him. I was too infatuated, this wasn't good. The level of power he now lorded over me, just by being, without even trying... it was terrifying. He had the power to break my heart.

It suddenly occurred to me that I was hearing my phone vibrating somewhere and I rolled over and found it in my purse on the floor by the bed. I pulled it out, saw it was Addison, grabbed my bathrobe, and snuck out of the room. Nick didn't even move. I pulled the door closed behind me and beelined for the living room.

"Addie," I gasped into the phone, as I swung the robe around me and tucked my legs under me on the couch, "You're never going to belie--"

"Sam, I have to tell you something," she said at the exact same time as I'd spoken.

We both paused.

"Go ahead," I said.

"Sam, I recorded a duet with Cora yesterday. A single. She's going to release it to promo the tour I'm going on with her. Did you know she's leaving on tour? The day after the party you're organizing for Nick? I bet that's why. I bet it's a secret going away party," Addison said.

"It might've started out that way, but I don't think it is anymore because ---" I started, but Addison spoke over me.

"Hugh thinks I'm going to be famous," she said, "Like more than Cora even. Z got me rights to this song that's hotter than hell, Sam, I'm serious. It's called Playing With Fire and it's amazing... It goes like this..." and she started humming this tune. She paused, "Z beat boxed it when he was telling me about it, it was way more impressive." She squealed, "Sam, I'm dizzy, it's happening so fast!"

"Speaking of things happening fast --" I tried again, but again Addison interrupted me.

"Hugh's a nice guy, you know?" she said. "I think Nick might be wrong about him cheating on Cora. I think he really loves her. He's such a nice guy, Sam."

"Well good," I blurted, "Because Cora gets to keep him."

"What?" Addison asked.

"Nick and Cora broke up last night," I said, pausing for dramatic effect. "They fought about me."

"They what?" Addison sounded shocked, "Oh my God, she must be heart broken."

"Heartbroken?" I laughed, "She accused him of cheating on her with me. That's real rich, isn't it? She's cheating on her husband and gets pissed off thinking Nick is cheating on her with me?"

Addison sniffed, "Well Nick's kind of a tool sometimes. You said so yourself."

"But he's not cheating on her with me," I said, "Or at least he wasn't before last night."

"What?" Addison now sounded angry. "You fucked him?"

"Well no," I said, "We slept - like literally sleeping slept - together last night. He kissed me. Addison, you'll never guess how it happened. I wanted to call you last night and tell you but things got going crazy after and I was gonna call you today when I got up... It was on the hood of his Escalade, Addie." I laughed, "Just like you guessed."

"And when is he planning on telling Cora all this?" she demaned.

"I told you, Cora broke up with him, it's no longer her business," I replied.

"He probably lied to you," Addison replied, "Cora wouldn't have broken up with him. She loves him."

"She doesn't even see him," I retorted, "She just sees him as a sex toy. He might as well be a vibrator for all she cares."

"How would you know? Nick's not exactly a credible source is he? He's just trying to get into your pants. You said he keeps going on and on about your ass. That's all you are to him."

"He's more credible than Cora is," I snapped. "And I heard what she said and did that night at the hotel. She didn't want to stay once they'd finished having sex, she was out of there faster than greased lightening!"

"Probably scared of the STDs she was collecting off the manwhore you're fucking," Addison's voice was dripping with disdain.

"If Nick has any STDs it's from the slutty bitch you're worshipping," I replied.

"I'm telling Cora about you and Nick," Addison said.

"Good! Tell her I'm more than happy to take him off her hands and that one day she'll see that he's the one that got away that she'll never get back."

"Nobody wants their garbage back once they throw it out," Addison snarled and she hung up.

I was so pissed I threw my cell phone across the couch, watched it bounce off the far arm rest, the accelerometer rotating so that Addison's stupid face spun around on the face of the phone. I let out a shrill noise of frustration and got up, fists balled and paced a couple times around the coffee table. "Take some fucking Midol, bitch," I muttered in the general direction of the phone.

"Are we angry at the couch?" Nick's voice echoed from the doorway and I jumped about a mile. He laughed, "Sorry, did I scare you?" He was still in just his tight fitting boxer-briefs. They were grey. He leaned against the door frame and smirked, bed head galore, eyes shining, arms folded, biceps big and beautiful.

"I didn't see you," I said.

"Do you usually start your mornings off calling your couch a bitch?" he smirked.

I picked up my phone, "Sorry. No. I just had an argument with Addison." I waved the phone for him to see.

Concern pinched his brow together, "A fight? About what?"

I didn't want to tell him it was about him and Cora and all that, so I shrugged, "Just... you know, girl stuff."

He nodded slowly. "I'm sure it'll work out," he said, "Right?"

"Yeah. It always does."

"That must be nice, having friends that can get over fights," he laughed. "God knows I don't have that with some of my friends..." A smile eeked its way across his face. "Some people don't know how to forget ancient history, you know?"

"Yeah," I replied.

He studied me for a second. "Go get dressed," he said.

"Why?"

"I'm taking you out for breakfast."

I laughed, "I have stuff for eggs here..."

"Yeah but it's a pancakes kind of morning. I can tell." He nodded. "C'mon."

I nodded. "Okay."

Chapter Twenty-Nine


"Eat," Nick encouraged, pushing the plate of pancakes at me. I stirred the little bowl of grits that'd come with my food, then sighed and pushed it away. Nick frowned, "Please eat. You need to eat."

"I can't," I replied. "I can't eat when Addison's pissed at me like this." I pulled my phone out for about the twelve-hundredth time.

Nick chewed a bite of his own pancakes slowly.

"I wish she'd answer my text," I said, shaking my head.

"She will when she cools down," he said.

I shook my head, "Not particularly. Not Addie. She's stubborn as hell. She always has been. You know one time she didn't talk to me for an entire summer when we were kids? Neither of us had any other friends - not even one - and yet she wouldn't speak to me. We had nobody to play with all summer but she was too stubborn to break down and talk to me. I don't even remember what we fought about that time."

Nick reached across the table and took my hand. "I'm sorry," he said.

"What? Why?"

He took a deep breath. "I heard... a little... of the conversation. Well, your end of it." He licked his lips nervously, his eyes apologetic. "I wasn't like... purposely eavesdropping or anything, but.. Well, you were yelling, you know?"

I covered my eyes with my hands.

"I'm sorry that I caused you guys to fight."

"You didn't," I said. "You were just... I don't know, a by product of it." I paused. "How much did you, um, hear?"

"Pretty much from me being a vibrator on," he answered.

I felt my face grow hot. "I'm sorry, I didn't mean for you to hear that," I said.

He shook his head, "It was... enlightening," he said. He paused. "There is one thing though, that I have a question about."

"What's that?"

"You said you heard everything at the hotel."

My mouth went dry. "I was in the bathroom."

"What?"

"When you and Cora were in the hotel room that night, the night we met. I was in the bathroom. I was having a smoke and Cora and you came in and I was about to go out and tell you I was there when she got naked and I couldn't and I sat there in the bathroom and I heard all of it." The words burst from my mouth.

"But... Cora went to the bathroom," he said, confusion lighting up his eyes.

"I was under the sink," I said.

"Damn," he said. Then he laughed and sat back, a smirk on his face. "So when I asked you to work for me as a private investigator based on your Monk-like abilities, you must've thought I was nuts. You didn't really have a Monk-moment, you actually knew anyways." He looked down at his plate.

"Well it's not like I'm horrible at it, I mean I found out about -----" I stopped mid-sentence.

Nick looked up. "About what?"

"Er..."

"Sam?"

I took a deep breath. "Okay so that day I came over your place... the first day Cora left her purse there?" He nodded, listening. "When you left the room, I looked through it, and... so... I um, found her cell phone in there, and... Z had called her..." I paused. "Z's seeing Cora. Like you were seeing Cora."

He stared at me. "Z is gay," he said.

"What?"

"Z's gay," Nick repeated.

I blinked. "But --"

"Z and Lawrence... they're not business partners."

I felt my face grow hot. "So Cora's not fucking Z?"

"Z literally gets sick at the thought of having sex with a woman," Nick answered. "Cora's not fucking Z."

"Oh God, I feel like such an idiot," I said.

"It's okay," Nick said, "You're not the first woman that's thought he was a straight arrow, but trust me, that guy's gayer than Elton John."

I covered my face. "Oh God you're paying me for nothing."

Nick laughed. "It's okay, Sam."

I shook my head. Then something occurred to me. I looked up. "Oh my God. You can't pay me at all. You need to take your money back."

"What?" he looked confused.

"If we start seeing each other, you need to take your money back or I'm just a hooker."

Nick literally snorted.

"Well it's true," I gasped.

He shook his head, took a sip of iced tea, an amused expression playing on his face as he swallowed and tried to regain composure after the almighty snort. He put the glass down and wiped his mouth with a napkin. "Samantha," he laughed, "You can still work for me and be my girlfriend."

"But I'm not really working for you if I'm the worst private eye ever..."

"You're my personal assistant," he reminded me.

"All I've done is plan a party."

"One fuck of a party," he pointed out.

"And one night I delivered the wrong size condoms."

He grinned, "Aren't you glad now that small was the wrong size?" he winked. I paused. That reminded me.... I reached into my purse and dug around. He raised an eyebrow. "Sam? What'cha lookin' for?" I pulled out the condom I'd gotten from Cora's bag and looked at it, then looked up at him, and tossed it across the table. He looked down at it. "Now?" he asked.

I shook my head, "This came out of Cora's purse, too," I explained. "Look at the size."

He looked. He looked up at me.

"Small." I said.

"Maybe it's for Hugh," Nick snickered.

"Please, that guy's toes are probably too big for a small condom," I said. "Nick, maybe it's not Z, but she's obviously seeing somebody else."

He cleared his throat and pushed the condom back across the table. "Put that thing away before the waiter comes over and thinks I take a small," he commanded. I chucked it into my purse again. Nick stared at me. He took a deep breath. "I know Cora wasn't exclusively with me, Sam," he said. "I mean, I wasn't ever... positive, but... I was fairly sure I wasn't the only one." He shook his head and looked away, like he couldn't bare to stare me in the eyes as he said the next words, "I just... thought I was lucky to have what little bit of her she could give me... and... I just... wanted more." He looked up at me. "I thought I could make her want more, too."

"She is such a hypocrite," I said, heatedly.

Nick laughed.

"No seriously, she expected you to be faithful to her to the point of firing me because she couldn't stand being jealous, but she runs with every single thing that has a penis."

Nick muttered something.

"What?"

"That's not always a requirement, I said," he repeated himself in a jumbled mess of words. I stared at him. He shrugged.

"Well, man, woman, or unicorn, I can't imagine anyone being given the opportunity to be loved by you and turning that down," I said.

Nick laughed, "Unicorn?"

"By the sounds, Cora has no limits..."

Chapter Thirty


I worried about Addison the rest of the day. Nick kept trying to distract me. I could tell it was bothering him that I wasn't paying as much attention to him as I usually did. He kept asking stupid questions and poking me and nudging me. He still didn't want to go home, so he stayed at my place another night and we ordered in Chinese food and he tweaked out when he realized I didn't have a TV. He went through all my CDs until he'd loade my six-disc changer with "approved" albums, and then finally coerced me into sitting on the living room carpet with a deck of cards to play poker.

"Loser each hand loses clothes, yes?" Nick said, dealing out the cards.

I raised an eyebrow.

"I want you naked," he explained.

I laughed, "You really think strip poker's the way to do that?"

"Sure," Nick answered.

"You're confident."

"I'm fucking good at poker," he replied. Nick grinned. "You need me to teach you how to play sugar?"

I shook my head, "My dad taught me once on a camping trip," I replied.

Nick smirked. "Okay then." He dealt out two cards face down and one card face up to each of us. I peeked at my cards. I had an Ace and a ten in the hole and a seven facing up. Nick had a six up. "Ante up?"

"Shirt," I said.

Nick grinned, "You wanna get naked too, huh baby?" he grinned. "Shirt it is. I see your shirt." He dealt out another card face up to each of us. Mine was a queen. His was a nine. I nodded at him and he dealt another card. "After I win this one, I'm gonna ante up with panties so I can see that ass of yours again." He grinned.

"We'll see about that," I answered. Nick dealt two more cards down and one up. My hole was Jack and King and my face-up was a deuce. I grinned up at him. "You in?" I asked.

He grinned back, "Oh hell yeah," he said.

"Let's see your five hand," I said.

Nick flipped over his cards. "Full house," he said, grinning and revealing a pair of nines and three sixes.

"Royal straight flush," I replied, flipping over my ten-Jack-Queen-King-Ace combo.

Nick stared at the cards. "Son of a bitch," he muttered.

"Take it off, Carter."

He pulled his shirt over his head. "Well that backfired," he muttered.

"You can quit if you want to," I said.

"Beginners luck," he persisted.

An hour and a half later, Nick was sitting on the floor opposite me with nothing but a pair of gym socks and a sofa pillow cushion and I was armed with a four of a kind that I hadn't revealed yet. I was trying to decide if I'd let him keep the cushion or the socks. Technically he'd only gotten the cushion on the technicality that I had both a tank top and a bra on under my t-shirt anyways.

It's not my fault I always dressed in layers and that he rarely wore underwear.

"Okay," Nick said, "Show your hand."

I was about to toss my cards down onto the carpet when there was a knock on my door. I looked at the clock. It was after eleven-thirty. I pointed at Nick, "Don't you go anywhere, I'll be right back to call my bets." I got to my feet, still in a tank top and jeans (yeah, I was that good), and went to the door. I peeked through the peep hole. Outside Addison stood on the porch.

I had to choke back a squeal of delight. "Nick you might wanna put something on again, Addie's here," I called.

"Thank God!" he yelled, "There's a serious draft in here!"

I yanked the door open. I was about to wrap my arms around Addison when I realized she wasn't alone on the porch. Cora was standing a few feet to the side, wearing a sullen expression and a denim jacket. Addison looked disgusted. Cora came over, "Is he here?" she demanded.

I licked my lips. "Even if he is it isn't your business. According to Addison, nobody wants their trash after it's been thrown away."

"He's only here to make me jealous," she said, "He doesn't give a shit about you. Don't be naive."

"Go to hell." I started to close the door, but Cora caught it and held it open.

"NICK!" she shrieked, and pushed her way past me.

Addison followed her, glowering at me.

"What the hell is your problem?" I demanded of her, "Two days ago you were rooting for me to make out with him on the hood of his car and now I'm getting the death stare?"

"Cora and I did some talkin'," Addison said.

Cora looked completely out of place in my dining room with her fancy make-up and wildly designer hair. She turned to look at me. "Where is he?"

"He's --"

"Right here," Nick said, stepping into the room. He was fully dressed again, arms crossed over his chest. He stared at Cora. "What're you doing here?" he asked.

Cora turned to look at him. "You're coming home," she replied, grabbing for him.

He ducked away easily. "I'm fine where I am," he said.

Cora narrowed her eyes. "You're like a fucking child!" she yelled, "Look at you, stubborn asshole. Standing here like you're making a point. You're just making an idiot of yourself. You're coming home now."

"You accused me of sleeping with her, and now I am," he responded. "See what you did? Now go away so we can get back to fucking."

Cora slapped him. The sound of the skin on her palm resounded in the dining room and Addison and I both gasped loudly. Nick stood there, his jaw flexed the direction she'd slapped him in and he took a long, low breath with his eyes closed. Then he turned and walked out of the room.

"YOU WALK AWAY FROM ME AND YOU CAN'T GET ME BACK, CARTER!" Cora screamed.

I heard a door slam down the hallway.

"FUCK YOU!" Cora screamed, her voice pitching. She turned on her heels. "Come!" she snapped at Addison as she walked by. Addie looked at me an for a split second I thought she was going to say no and stay and that we'd be okay, but instead she turned and followed Cora out the door and down the driveway.

I watched until the car drove away carrying them.

Then I went to the bathroom and knocked. "Nick?" I called. "Are you okay?"

He opened the door. "Yeah... I'm okay... but I kinda broke your wall a little..." he pulled open the door and I saw a dent in the wall where he'd obviously punched it quite hard. "I'll pay for it to be fixed," he added sheepishly.

I stared at the dent in the wall.

"She knows slapping me like that sets me off," he said. "She knows it and she did it on purpose." He growled and sat down on the closed lid of the toilet. I was still staring at the dent in the wall. Nick sighed and stared down at his feet, his hands running through his hair, messing it up, making it stand up all crazy-like. "She's always known exactly what buttons of mine to push," he muttered.

I turned to look at him. "You aren't here just to make her jealous, right?"

Nick looked up. "What?"

"Like you didn't just come to me to make her jealous and come get you, right? This wasn't like some part of a scheme or anything like that, right?"

"Why would you think that?"

I shrugged. "Just answer me."

"Of course not," he replied simply.

Chapter Thirty-One


I feel like I wake up to a cell phone vibrating every morning. Well, the morning after Cora and Addison's dramatic display in my dining room was no different. At least it was Nick's phone that time. It was vibrating so hard it moved in a semi-circle and dropped off the end table. Nick groaned, "No," he said, "Too early... go to hell..." he rolled over and smashed his face into the pillows. The phone vibrated from the floor pitifully.

Finally it stopped.

Nick sighed in relief. I cuddled closer to him. He snaked his arm around me.

I kissed his chin.

The phone started vibrating again. "What the hell," Nick muttered.

"Maybe it's important?" I guessed.

"Ugh. Nothing important happens before noon, everyone should know that." He rolled over and grabbed the phone from the floor. He stared at the display.

"What is it?" I asked.

"It's... Kevin..." he answered the phone, "'Lo?" He squinted up at the ceiling, the light from the window streaming in his eyes. "No, dude, I ain't seen the TV, I'm in the only house in Los Angeles that doesn't have a TV in it... Why?" Nick covered his eyes with his hand. Then he uncovered them and sat up. "What? You're shitting me. You've gotta be shitting me." He swung his legs out of the bed and stood up quickly, "Tell me you're shitting me."

"What's the matter?" I asked.

Nick bolted out the door of the room, though.

"Ugh." I followed him, pulling on my robe as I went. I padded down the hall after him. He was turning on my lap top, which I'd left sitting on a desk in the living room. "Nick?" I said, "What's wrong?"

He'd hung up his phone. He looked at me, hair all messed up, his eyes wild with surprise. "Z's dead."

"What?"

"Z? My producer? He's dead. It's on the news."

"Z, Cora's Z?"

"Yes Cora's Z, my Z, the Z."

The computer came to life and Nick double clicked to pull open the Internet. He typed Z's name into Google and up popped breaking news stories. My breath caught in my throat. "Fuck," I whispered. A picture of the house I'd cased popped up, a news reporter standing in front of it.

"Justin Platt - better known as Z - was famous for producing hit singles in the pop music industry. The 36 year old artist was found dead in his Hollywood home this morning. Although the official cause of death has not been found, authorities seem to be treating this as a suicide situation..." Nick shook his head as he read. "Fucking hell," he whispered.

"I'm sorry," I said, because I wasn't sure what else to say.

Nick was just staring at the computer screen.

I rubbed his shoulders.

He looked up at me, "I was supposed to go record with him today," he said thickly. "I was supposed to be working with him all week. I don't know what to do... I don't know what to think..." He squeezed the bridge of his nose. "God damn, he was one of my best friends in the industry. I don't have a lot of friends... We used to play golf together... He's a terrible golfer."

"I'm sorry," I repeated, still at a loss.

"I hope they give golfing lessons in Heaven," Nick commented. He bit his fist and turned back to the computer screen. He scrolled until a picture of Z filled the screen. It was a picture of him from yesterday, standing in front of his studio, Cora and Addison were in the background surrounded by security. Z looked happy and healthy and his eyes twinkled. The photo was captioned Producer Justin "Z" Platt stopped to talk to several reporters yesterday who had gathered outside of Z Productions studio to inquire about Cora Walters' latest efforts. Z revealed he was working with Cora's new protoge, Addison Mueller, a "firecracker" up and coming singer who he described, saying, "She may even end up being a bigger deal than Cora herself." "He looked so happy there," Nick said, staring at the picture.

I stared at it, too. Something about it was bugging me, but I couldn't quite figure out what it was...

"I can't believe he's dead," Nick mumbled.

Nick's phone didn't stop ringing the rest of the day. Every time that he hung up someone else was calling to talk to him about Z - everyone from reporters to radio DJs to all four other Backstreet Boys. I sat on the couch and read a book while he fielded phone call after phone call. Finally, after pretty much everyone and their mother had called him, he dropped on the couch with me and laid his head in my lap. He stared up at me. "I'm so tired," he mumbled.

I ran my fingers through his hair.

His cell phone rang again.

"For the love of God," he muttered. He started to answer it.

I reached out my hand, "Let me. I'm your assistant. I'll take a message and tell them to call again at some point." He handed me his phone and I answered it, "Carter," I said cooly.

There was a long pause, then a click, and the dial tone.

I pulled the phone from my ear and looked to see who it'd been.

Cora.

I sighed, "The dragon lady was calling you."

Nick closed his eyes. "So much for if I walk away," he muttered. But he didn't take the phone and call her back or anything either. I put the phone down on the arm rest of the couch and continued running my fingers through his hair... "I can't wrap my mind around it," he said. "I just can't imagine Z killing himself."

Chapter Thirty-Two


The rumors started almost immediately. Pretty much everyone who had even the faintest clue who Z was quickly ruled out the suicide that the authorities were insisting had killed him. "It's like Kurt Cobain all over again," Nick muttered, staring at the computer screen and scrolling through a forum full of musicians discussing the producer's death. Everyone and their mother was implicated in the situation - some pointed wild fingers at Lawrence, Z's partner, others at Hugh Walters, or even Cora - but Nick just shook his head and scrolled through the pages and pages of wild opinions, and muttered quietly to himself.

Personally, I wasn't sure what to think. I didn't know the guy really enough to form an opinion, and, to be honest, after missing the pretty huge bit about him being gay and accusing him of having an affair with Cora, I was too scared to voice any further errs. So I listened to Nick like a sounding board as he talked on and on and on all weekend about his personal insights and theories.

The bottom line was the case was closed but nobody was willing to let it go.

Nick received an invitation to Z's funeral from Lawrence, who said that Z would've liked it if I came, too. "He thought the bagels and guitar strings day was hilarious, he really did," Lawrence told Nick, and Nick relayed the message to me. I felt even worse because when Z had brought it up at Addison's audition we'd been so quick to defend me when really the guy just thought it was a hoot.

The day of the funeral, Nick put on a black suit and stood in front of my bathroom mirror, adjusting his tie. I came in behind him and put my arms around him as he tightened and loosened the thing, trying to make it hang just-so. He sighed and pressed his palms on the counter top and stared down into the sink, his eyes sad and a defeated sort of vibe emanating from him.

"You okay?" I asked.

Nick wiped his eyes. "i'm... frustrated, I guess..." he mumbled.

"Frustrated?"

"People work all their fuckin' lives and it gets taken away like this..." he snapped his fingers. "Why bother?"

"Because where would we be if we didn't work all our lives?" I asked, "If we didn't pursue passions and have ambition?"

Nick shrugged. "Who knows, but who says we wouldn't all be better off without the money and the fortune and fame? It changes people. Look at your friend. Less than a week and she's already crumbling. It ruins things. It kills people." He ducked away into the hall and left me standing there in the bathroom alone. I heard his footsteps fade down the hall.

I took my time getting ready to give him some space. When I went down the hall to the living room, Nick was sitting in the chair next to the couch staring down at his phone, the stereo playing a local radio station that was playing back-to-back hits that Z had produced in tribute to him. Nick looked up from his phone when I came in the room. "It doesn't kill all people," I said, as though there hadn't been an hour-long pause in the conversation.

Nick sighed, "I know," he said.

"It didn't kill you."

"Came damn close," he said.

"But it didn't," I replied. I studied him a second. "Is there something else bothering you?" I asked.

Nick shook his head, but in a way that I knew something else was bothering him. But I didn't press it any further because he obviously didn't wanna talk about whatever it was. I picked up my keys and my purse. "We don't wanna be late," I told him.

Nick stood up followed me out the door. "I'll drive," he said suddenly, redirecting me to the Escalade that still stood parked in my driveway. I wasn't sure I wanted to ride with him again while he was upset after the recklessness of the last ride we'd taken, but against my better judgement I followed him to his car and climbed in.

A quick, thankfully uneventful drive later and Nick parked in front of Z's house. There were already several cars parked in the driveway and along the street out front so that by the time we got there, we drove past the house and parked almost a block away on the side of the road and walked back. Nick pointed out cars to people he recognized - a lot of big celebrities were there, I realized, and I felt out of place all of a sudden, but Nick grabbed my hand just as we reached the bottom of the driveway and snaked his fingers through mine and led me up to the house.

Lawrence answered the door when Nick rang the bell and waved us in. "Hey Nick," he had a terribly bereft expression on his face. He glanced at me, "Hey Fiesty," he said, the slightest smile playing his lips.

"I'm really sorry man," Nick said. He shook Lawrence's hand.

"Very sorry," I added when Lawrence turned to shake mine, too.

Lawrence nodded. "Thanks. Help yourself to some food, on the breakfast bar. Most everyone's outback." He waved us on.

Nick and I walked through the house and I looked around. There was a lot of art and old books and antique looking gadgety things like a hand held telescope and an old antique chair hanging up on the wall. Nick led me through several rooms to a kitchen with a wide breakfast bar, where a buffet style spread had been set up. Hugh Walters was lingering by it, a plate with a couple squares of cheese and a pickle held aloft, looking down at a trayful of sandwiches in contemplation. Hugh looked up as Nick and I walked over. Nick's eyes narrowed. "Hello, hello," Hugh greeted us both.

"Hey," Nick answered. He hovered as I reached forward and shook Hugh's hand, though Nick didn't offer a fist bump or anything. He just stood there.

"Oh don't tell me you think I did it, too," Hugh laughed. "I've gotten so many dirty looks today... I traced most of them to internet rumors." He shook his head, a slight smirk to his face. "I never would've killed Justin," he said, "Insulting they'd even think it. Especially given what a shoddy job of it they've done."

"I know better than to think you'd get your hands that dirty," Nick said, smirking as Hugh wiped his hands with a handerchief he'd withdrawn from his pocket.

Hugh smiled. "At least one person's got faith in me." He turned to me. "Aren't you Addison's friend?" he asked.

I nodded, although part of me wanted to say that I wasn't sure if I was anymore or not, given all his stupid wife had done to change her. Hugh said, "She's outback somewhere with Cora."

"Thanks," I answered. Mental note to self, avoid going somewhere outback.

Nick turned to the food and started picking bits he wanted, filling a plate, ignoring Hugh's presence. Hugh stared at him for a long moment, then said to me, "Are the two of you... together?"

"I'm his personal assistant," I replied.

Hugh laughed, "In LA, honey, that means yes." He turned and walked away, leaving Nick and I alone as Nick loaded up his plate.

"We gotta call that place," he said, "They're serving the dumplings here. Don't wanna have the same food at both parties. They're too close together, they'll think I called and got a number."

I stared at the dumplings piled on his plate.

"Don't forget," he added, and he walked away.

Chapter Thirty-Three


I grabbed a couple of dumplings and a fruit kebob and carried my plate out the sliding glass doors that led into the wide backyard, following Nick. I looked around, but he'd disappeared. I stood awkwardly by the sliding doors, holding my plate, wondering where the hell he could've gotten to with a pile of dumplings the size of Everest.

Suddenly Lawrence was at my side. He glanced at my plate. "Justin loved those fruit kebobs, that's why I ordered them," he said, voice thick. I looked up at him. He was a massive guy - I mean he worked as a body guard, he was huge. It was awkward feeling to see his eyes all red and blotchy, obviously from tears. He drew a deep breath. "He was a good guy," he said weepily, "And happy, too. We were happy. It took years... but... finally..." Lawrence paused.

I rubbed his arm as consolingly as I could. "Have you been together long?"

"Officially, no," he said. "Officially, we only got together in the last two years."

"Officially?" I asked.

"It took a long time for Justin to come out," Lawrence explained. "His family doesn't understand, you know? He was scared to lose his parents... even if it meant gaining me. His parents were super religious, so we walked thin ice for over ten years, keeping it on the down low until Justin decided that they needed to accept him for who he was."

"I completely understand that," I said. "My brother's super religious and he doesn't accept anything I do, ever. It sucks losing family because they're too crazy in the head to accept you the way you are. I can't imagine choosing between my family and the person I loved."

Lawrence nodded. "It was really hard on him. Especially at this time of year. Justin was real close to his pops, you know, and he tried calling last week and they wouldn't accept the phone call."

I frowned. "That's terrible."

Lawrence nodded. He snuffled. I handed him my napkin and he used it to blow his nose. "They refused to even come to his funeral," he choked up. "They said that to them, he died two years ago when he came out." Lawrence wiped his eyes.

I shook my head and wrapped my arms around Lawrence as best I could, though they couldn't reach quite all the way around. That was okay. He hugged me back and squeezed the hell out of me. I felt like I was in a vice grip. "It's so nice for someone to care," Lawrence whimpered. It was like being hugged by a massively emotional bear.

As Lawrence was hugging me, I spotted Nick across the yard. He was arguing with Cora. I patted Lawrence's back and he let me go and I excused myself quickly, feeling bad that I hadn't spotted Nick before so I could've gotten him off Cora's radar faster.

"If you don't keep your god damn emotions in check --" he was hissing under his breath as I rushed up.

I cut between them and pushed him back. "Calm down, cowboy," I commanded. People were looking over at the two of them. Cora was glowering. "Just relax. She's not worth it."

Cora flipped her hair over her shoulder and walked away.

"Fucking hell," Nick muttered, and he ran his hands through his hair and turned. He spat at the grass. "She's so --"

"It's okay. Relax. Calm down." I pushed him back into a lawn chair and he sat down. I knelt in front of him. "What happened?" I asked.

"She's just --" Nick shook his head. "She's infuriating. I dunno."

"What were you doing talking to her?"

"I had a question..." Nick replied. He sighed.

I stared up at him for a moment, trying to discern what to say next. "You're wondering about those rumors on the internet, aren't you?" I asked.

Nick hesitated. "I dunno. Maybe a little." He paused.

"Do you think she did it?" I whispered.

Nick shrugged. "Not really. I just... had to hear her say that, you know?" he asked.

"Okay." I paused. "But she got pissed when you asked?"

"Well..." Nick stared off across the lawn.

I looked where he was looking - at Cora. I smacked his leg. "Stop looking at her," I commanded.

Nick looked back at me. "She just got upset, because of the fight we had last night, at your place." He licked his lips. "I asked her about Addison, what she'd said to get her so...different...in so short a time." Nick sighed. "I was just trying to get some answers, you know?"

"I appreciate answers, especially about Addison, but getting pissed off at Cora in public - in a place where Hugh is at - isn't your safest move," I laughed, "Next thing you know there'll be a second murder and more of those fricking dumplings and the party we're planning will be your funeral instead. Do you want that?"

"Of course not," he answered. He wiped his forehead with his hand. "Hot damn that girl can piss me off like no tomorrow," he muttered. He sighed. Then, "Hey, the dumplings." He glanced around, "Where the fuck'd my plate go?"

"What is with you and those dumplings?" I asked.

"They're really good."

I sighed.

"Could you get me some more?" he asked, "Or find my plate or something?"

"I'll go get you some."

I got up and went inside and got Nick a couple more dumplings - though the stack was no where near as huge as he'd piled them on his first trip in - and headed back outside. He was still sitting exactly where I'd left him. I walked over and held out the plate of dumplings. "Thanks," he said. He took the plate and balanced it on his lap. I sat down on the chair beside him. He took a bite of the first dumpling. "I know I'm being stupid with the dumplings and arguing with Cora. I know this isn't the time for either of those things," he said as he chewed. "I just... I can't believe Z is dead, you know? He was the best producer I ever worked with." He shook his head, "It's just a huge waste."

"Lawrence was pretty upset," I said. "He said that Z just came out two years ago. They had a secret relationship for ten years before Z dared to come out because of his parents. Only two years able to be open about your relationship with someone -- when you've been with them so long... Can you imagine?"

"Yeah, I can," Nick muttered.

I glanced over at him.

"Cora and I started dating back when she opened for BSB," he said. "Like five or six years ago..." He laughed, "We never did get to go public, did we?"

"She was dating you when she met and married Hugh?" I asked, aghast.

Nick glanced over, "She wanted the record deal, you know?"

"And you didn't see anything fucked up about that?"

Nick shrugged. "Everything was fucked up at that point," he replied. "I was on drugs, so was she, for that matter so was Hugh. I mean we all saw how fucked up the whole situation was, but none of us had the mental 'whatever' to realize we needed to stop it." He leaned back in the chair, chewing on his third dumpling already.

I sighed. "I'll never understand show business, I guess," I said. "I mean, it seems like if you love someone, you love them. Regardless of what other people can get you if you were to fuck them, you know? Everything in Hollywood is about climbing some imaginary ladder and it doesn't matter who you use as a rung."

Nick nodded. "Maybe that's why Z killed himself," Nick said.

"So you decided that you believe that now?" I asked.

Nick shrugged, "It makes more sense than any other story, and I guess we all gotta believe something if we're gonna make it through this." He stuffed the last dumpling into his mouth and stood up. "I'll be right back," he said, mouth full.

"Getting more?" I asked.

"Yeah," he replied. "And don't cancel them from our party, okay? I can't get enough of these things."

"Luckily for you, I didn't have a chance to call them yet," I replied.

I watched Nick trot across the lawn carrying his empty plate. And even more interestingly, I watched Cora watch Nick cross the lawn carrying his empty plate... and then she turned to Addison and the two of them walked around the side of the house towards the driveway and out of sight.

Chapter Thirty-Four


"You ain't never gonna guess what Hugh Walters just showed me."

I was grocery shopping, Nick was off contracting a new producer with Hugh Walters for the song they were working on. "This is huge," he added.

I smirked. "I didn't know you swayed that way, Carter."

"What?" he paused, mind caught up with where I'd just gone, and yelled, "DUDE! No! Gross! You're sick as fuck. No, wait. Lemme text you a picture. Hold on." He hung up.

I snorted at his reaction and walked down the aisle, grabbing a box of cereal and tucking it into the cart. It took Nick a couple moments to send the picture. I sighed and grabbed the stuff for pancakes and stuck that in the cart, too, and was turning the corner onto the juice and cookie aisle when my phone finally vibed. I pulled open the picture and nearly screamed right there in the dead center of the grocery store.

Addison's single cover. The text read. And under it was... well, Addison. Kind of.


I stared at it.

My phone vibed again, this time Nick calling me. I answered it numbly, thankful to be able to stop staring at it. "What do you think?" Nick asked.

"She's naked," I choked.

"It's hot as hell but, damn," Nick muttered.

"She's naked," I repeated.

"It's the last song Z produced. They wanna get it out while he's still hot in the news, for publicity, you know?"

"Yeah I understand that," I said, "But... Nick... and I stress this. She's NAKED."

"Is she? I didn't notice," he joked.

"Nick! She's literally got nothing on her body except fake fire!" I squeaked.

Nick laughed, "Sam, I know... I mean, she's a stripper, right? She's comfy with it so why not I guess... Rhianna and Christina did it..."

"They're Rhianna and Christina," I said, "This is Addison, Nick! I grew up with her, I remember taking baths with her when we were like three years old."

"So you've seen her naked before, this shouldn't be such a big shock," he teased.

"NICK!" I shrieked. Several people looked up from various products they were looking at.

"Okay, okay," he said. He took a deep breath. "I understand why you're concerned. I didn't have anything to do with it, though, so I mean... I can't really... change it, you know?"

"I know," I said.

"If it was Brian and he was na--" Nick paused. "Y'know, that analogy isn't gonna work 'cos if Brian posed naked on a CD cover I'd need to find out whassup and where the real Brian is 'cos he wouldn't ever do that. Okay so if AJ was naked on a CD cover --" he paused again. "No, no, I wouldn't question that at all, 'cos he's AJ and I can actually picture him doing that." Nick paused. "Yanno what my friends are fucked up. But I understand where you're coming from worrying about her."

I laughed in spite of myself. Then I took a deep breath, "Nick, what in hell could Cora have said to Addison to change her so quickly? I mean... It was instant."

"Who in fuck knows," Nick replied.

"I mean we fought about -- well, about you, and --"

"Babe? Hugh's calling me, I gotta get back in the studio before he has a fit. I'm really sorry I'm cutting you off. Remember what you're saying, we'll talk about it tonight. I'll stop and get us dinner. Do you like sushi? See ya tonight." He hung up.

I sighed and grabbed a couple boxes of granola bars and slid my phone into my pocket. I actually didn't care for sushi - like at all - but that's okay. My mind swiveled around the various things that had gone down in that first fight with Addison... She'd been happily telling me about Cora and the song and how Z had beat boxed and Hugh had said he'd be amazing... Then I'd blurted out that Cora would be staying with Hugh because Nick and I had hooked up and Addison had gone through the roof.

It was as though in the Nick versus Cora face-off we'd each gained custody of one of the two of them and that had been our fuel for fighting.

Then the next time I'd seen her she'd been angry and all she'd said was Cora and I did some talkin'.

I got the groceries home and unloaded them into the cupboards before Nick called asking if sushi sounded good and I said no and he decided he'd grab a pizza. I cleaned the dishes up and wiped down the dining room table and when Nick's headlights lit up the driveway, I opened the door to find him struggling to get out of the Escalade with a pizza box and also a large-ish flat screen TV box.

"What the hell...?" I gasped, stepping out onto the porch.

Nick looked up, "Oh good. C'mere and carry the pizza and the DVD player in."

I walked across the driveway barefoot, staring at him incredulously, "What in hell is this?" I asked, taking the boxes he was holding out to me.

"I'm sick of no TV," he replied, "So tomorrow cable's being installed here and we'll get this party started." He held up a handful of DVDs, which he piled on top of the boxes he'd already handed to me. There were three action movies, a couple horror flicks, The Goonies, and a porno.

I cleared my throat and held up the porno.

He grinned. "In case we get frisky?" I hit his shoulder with the DVD and he laughed, "Okay no porn, got it." He unloaded the TV and slammed the Escalade door and we walked inside.

He was faster setting the TV up than I was getting napkins and cups and the milk from the kitchen and by the time I got back from out there he'd already loaded up The Goonies. "I figured every TV should be inaugerated with this one," he grinned.

"I've never actually watched this all the way through," I confessed.

Nick stared at me. "I gotta go," he joked. I grabbed him by the wrist and he laughed and came back in the room. "I can't believe you've never seen this..." he shook his head, "It's a classic."

"I never liked the Coreys," I said.

"Me either -- well I mean this and Stand By Me - Feldman was insanely awesome in both - but generally not really," he shrugged, "But still, it's the mother-fucking Goonies, man."

I shrugged. "I just never got to see it."

"Well you're in for a treat then. Wait 'til you see the WHERE'S THE BEEF?! lady." He laughed.

"Throw momma from a train?"

"Yes!" He hooted.

I laughed as the DVD menu came up and Nick flipped the pizza box open. He grabbed a slice and flung himself backwards onto the couch, kicking off his sneakers. His socks were dirty. I grabbed a piece, too, and we sat there in silence watching as the movie began with the various shots of the guys in the prison and then all the kids around town and stuff.

That's when something occurred to me.

"Your Journey shirt." I looked over at him.

Nick looked up from his pizza. "Excuse me?"

"The night you came over and we went for the drive and you kissed me... You had on an old, worn out Journey tour shirt," I explained, "I remember thinking it was an awesome shirt and I was kinda jealous you had it."

"Okay?" he looked confused. "Are you asking me to give you my shirt?" he asked.

"No but Cora had it," I said.

"What?"

"That video of Z, when he was talking about Addison and how great her voice was and everything outside the studio, before he died? Cora had the shirt on in the background. She was wearing it when she came here that night. There was something about the video that was driving me crazy and I couldn't figure out what it was, and that was it. She had your shirt on."

Nick blinked. He stared at me. "What...?" he laughed.

"I just realized --"

"Out of no where? You just thought of that out of no where?"

"Yeah," I nodded.

Nick laughed, "Damn. You really are Monk-like." He paused. "We have the same shirt. We ordered them at the same time on the internet."

"Oh."

He nodded. "So it doesn't mean anything that she had it on."

"I didn't really think it meant anything," I said, "I was just -- noticing, I guess. Well I mean it would've been weird, like how did she get your shirt but if she owns the same one then I mean it's not even your shirt, it's just a shirt and --"

Nick was staring at me, one eyebrow raised.

"I'm rambling."

He nodded.

"Sorry," I said.

Nick laughed, "It's all good. I think it's cute." He hit play on the DVD again, and we watched the Goonies find buried treasure. Nick pulled me into his chest and ran his hands across my arms, his cheek resting on my forehead and I sighed contentedly, just glad that he thought my crazy rambling was cute.

Chapter Thirty-Five


"They said don't touch, that you're not good for me... But I couldn't resist... The more you tell me no, the more that I want it... And now aren't I sorry, for all the things I've done... Turns out they were right and I ended up burned... Oh I've been a bad bad girl... I guess this is what I get for playing with fire... You took my love and broke my heart... I guess this is what I get for playing with fire... Playing with fire... I- I- I- I-.... I - I- I- I-.... played with fire."

Addison's song was all the hell over the radio. Her voice filled grocery stores and the mall and blasted from peoples stereos in midday traffic. It was a catchy song, I understood why everyone was listening madly to it. Under any other circumstances I knew I would've been, too. But it was driving me crazy because I didn't hear it for the first time squealing in the living room with Addie. It broke my heart because this was exactly what we'd both always dreamed would happen... but it was happening without me involved.

I wanted to call her but Nick kept telling me that she'd call when she was ready. "If you call her, she's just gonna be a bitch," he said, "I learned that from trying to call my siblings before. When they're ready to talk to you, they'll call, but if you call before that all you're gonna get is hurt."

I nodded. And I didn't call her.

The song shot through the Billboard charts like it, too, was on fire. At some point it crossed the line of being a cool tribute to Z's death and it became purely about Addison. Over the next week, she was on TV on various talk shows with Cora and they promoed the hell out of the tour. "We have a duet we'll be performing for the first time on stage," Cora said on Good Morning America.

Addison nodded, "It's hotter than hell. The whole tour is."

I looked over at Nick who was sitting beside me on the couch eating cereal, watching the show with me. "Let's watch something else."

"You're the one that wanted to see it," he said. "And you have the remote."

I looked down and realized he was right, I did. I lifted it to change the channel. I paused. Addison was just about to perform her song for the first time live. My heart caught in my throat and I lowered the remote as the thick drumline started beating and she stood back to the audience... She whipped around, her hair fanning out around her. "They said don't touch..." she began.

I threw the remote across the couch to Nick and got up and went to the bathroom. I wiped my face with a wet cloth so I didn't have to admit, even to myself, that I was crying. I clutched the edge of the bathroom sink and coughed. The door opened and Nick came in, ran a hand over my back, and pulled me up from bending over the basin. He turned me so I was facing him, face soaked and all, and he softly brushed my hair behind my ears. He stared down into my eyes, "I'm sorry," he whispered.

"I hate that I'm not a part of this," I choked. "We waited for this our whole lives."

"I know," Nick whispered. Then he bent softly forward and pressed his mouth against mine. My lips tingled with the touch of him and I wrapped my arms around his neck and he tightened his touch against my back, pressing our torsos together... his hand slipped over the curve of my bottom and he hummed in my mouth. Then he turned me, backed me into the hallway and we bumped into the wall. I scrambled my hand behind me until I found the door knob for the bedroom and we stumbled through it, our mouths never breaking apart...

We fell onto the bed and his hands pushed up my shirt, slid it off my head, and my mind spun as the cotton separated us and when he came back into view I stared up at the curve of his chin, at the blue of his eyes... at the way his hair hung over his forehead... He smiled and slid his own shirt off over his head and reached for his belt buckle. I didn't stop staring at him, even as he looked down to undo his jeans. I could hardly breathe.

Nick dropped his jeans and undid mine as I lay there, arms over my head still. He bent down and when he undid the button, he kissed my stomach. I shifted my hips and moaned. He laughed and pulled my jeans away, kissed up my torso until he was face to face with my bra, and kissed softly in the gap between the cups, his eyes rolled up to look at me. He looked like a fierce cat about to pounce, a lion or something. His hands snaked up the sides until they tangled with my fingers over my head and he straddled me, his charcoal colored boxers buldging against me. He ran his hands over my bra, around the back of me, and undid the clasp.

The sound of GMA echoed through the house and down the hall, though it was too quiet to hear the singing or talking, only the cheering, and it was like we had an audience cheering us on as Nick descended mouth-first upon me. I ran my hands through his hair and gasped for breath.

"Oh my God," I choked as he slid his fingers against me. I felt every muscle in my body tighten and he laughed around my breast, his mouth barely pausing in its work to make the husky sound. I felt my eyes roll back and I grabbed onto the pillow's edges with my fists.

"You ain't felt nothin' yet," he whispered, and he kissed a trail down the length of me, pulling away my panties as he went... I thought my heart would stop. I gasped and moaned and kicked my legs and he grabbed hold of my knees and held them down. He laughed, "Don't kill me..."

"You're killing me," I moaned.

Nick grinned, and leaned into me. I felt like screaming. I've never felt like screaming during sex before, but the anticipation had been building since I met him and he was like... I don't know, it was like he was electrically charged, like every time our skin made contact it sent currents through me, and when his mouth touched me... I seriously thought I might black out. It was like there were fireworks behind my eyelids, like my world was shattering, like I might die right there because surely nothing else would ever, ever be good again after he stopped. This was the end all moment. The apocalypse.

"Nick! Holy shit!" I yelled.

He suddenly stopped and I panted, sweat covering my brow and my breasts, and he crawled across the bed until he was leaning over me. He stared down into my eyes. I wanted him in me so fucking bad. I reached for him, pressing my palms against his back, pulled him down on top of me so that I felt the weight of him, his pelvis pressed against mine. At some point he'd shed his boxers, though in all the waves of pleasure that had engulfed my senses, I had not even the faintest idea of when he'd shed that last bit of cloth that parted us.

And then he was there, all around me, enveloping me, inside me, outside me, everywhere. I clutched him, my nails digging into his back, and he moaned into my mouth and we moved together, synchronized to our heartbeats... Our kiss broke apart as the momentum built and Nick pressed his face into my neck as he pressed into me, and I wrapped my legs around him... he rolled over, pulling me on top and I felt like Lady Godiva or something. I bent my knees and used them to push myself up and down, staring at his chest, at his jawline, at his closed eyes as he pressed his head back into the pillow, his mouth open as he gasped air into his lungs. I ran my hands over his chest and abdomen, just feeling his skin and his chest rising and falling. I swear I could almost feel his heart pounding out of his ribcage...

"Sam, oh God Sam," he groaned, and he slid his hands onto my hips, pulled me down, and held me there, gasping for air.

I closed my eyes, and just sat there in the moments following, the adrenaline slowly draining from my veins. Nick's pants were slower, heavier... and finally I rolled away and landed in a garbled heap beside him on the bed. I felt like gelatin. He sounded exhausted. He waited a moment, our bodies just void of energy, and then he rolled over into me, his arm wrapped around my waist, and pressed his face into the back of my neck, pulled me close to him... "I just wanna hold you," he said quietly.

"I'm not going anywhere," I answered, "I don't think I could if I wanted to right now," I laughed softly.

Nick chuckled into my hair.

"You're incredible," I whispered.

But I don't know if he heard me because he'd fallen asleep.

I lay there in the dark, feeling him breathing as he slept, and realized I had Addison's song stuck in my head.

I guess this is what I get for playing with fire....

Prologue Part III


"You cannot tell anybody what I am about to tell you. Not ever. Do you understand me?"

I nodded.

Nick's hair hung in his eyes and he peered down at me through the strands that caught on the bridge of his nose. "Hugh Walters is dead."

I blinked in surprise, "What??"

"Dead," Nick said. "Hugh Walters is dead."

"When?" I asked, my eyebrows pinching together, a hundred thousand things going through my mind.

"Just now," Nick replied. He took a deep breath. "You need to go... before everyone finds out you were fighting with him... They might think you've done it or something..."

"But I didn't," I said, "You know I didn't, that's ridiculous, I've been downstairs here where everyone can see me for over an hour... Where's Cora? She's probably done it..." I looked around, craning my neck.

"Cora didn't do it..." Nick answered, his voice annoyed with the accusation. He pulled away, his face drawing away from my face.

"Then who?" I demanded.

"Go home, Sam," he said in a final, commanding voice... and something in his tone was so final that I knew he knew exactly what happened.

"No," I said, "Not until you tell me what's going on.

He straightened his suit as he straightened his spine, sniffed, looked around, jaw set, and said, "I guess that's it, then. Good night." He walked away.

And I stood there staring as he walked away, as his back melted into the crowd... I could still smell him. My hands were shaking... "Have some champagne, miss," a waiter said, suddenly appearing at my side... and I grabbed the last flute on his tray as he passed by... downing the glass quickly so the bubbles would take away my consciousness...

I woke up on my bathroom floor, head spinning. I rolled over, my heart hammering my chest a million miles an hour, memory hazy. The entire night before was nothing but a blur of color and light and noise in my head. I blinked my eyes, and focused on the sight of Addison leaning over me, concern all over her face, mingled with tears. "Oh thank God," she gasped.

"Addie?" I choked.

She clutched me to her. "You had me scared to death," she sobbed, and she pressed her face into my shoulders as she hugged me tight.

Chapter Thirty-Six


I woke up alone.

I stretched. Every muscle in my body ached. I looked where he'd been and found only rays of sun coming in the window in his place. A quick glance around and I knew he had to be here somewhere - only his boxers were missing from the floor. I got up and tugged my t-shirt on over my head. I walked down the hallway, touching the knob of the wide-open bathroom door, until I found Nick sitting on the couch, staring at the TV, a muted game of The Price Is Right blinking and flashing from the screen.

I sat down next to him and he looked over, "Hey, you woke up," he said. He smiled.

"Yeah," I said. I laid down so my head was in his lap and stared up at him. He turned the TV off and looked down at me. "That was insanely amazing," I cooed.

"It was pretty good," he said, smirking.

"I literally wouldn't have minded if I'd died," I exaggerated. "It would've been a good way to go."

Nick laughed.

"So the Price is Right, huh?" I asked, turning my head to look at the screen.

"Yeah," Nick said, "It's all I could find to watch." His hand slid along my back.

"Muted?"

"It's better muted. You can't hear all the idiots screaming."

I laughed. I rolled again to watch him as he watched the screen. He yawned and I found myself thinking the roof of his mouth was cute. Oh God, I thought, disgusted with myself. I really was in way deeper than I ever should've allowed myself to be... but after that mind-blowing sex, how could I not be? I would've been perfectly happy living on a deserted island with him and doing nothing but... well, him.

He glanced down. "What?" he asked, a bemused smile playing across his lips.

"Just you," I replied.

"Me?" he asked with a chuckle.

"Yeah," I replied.

He stared down at me for a moment. "I'm not that great," he said. "You think too much of me." He lifted my head gently and slid out from under me. Nick paced across the room and looked out the window.

"You okay?" I asked, sitting up.

Nick licked his lips, "Yeah, I'm alright." He sighed.

"No you aren't," I argued. "What's wrong?"

Nick shook his head. He turned to face me. "Just when you look at me like that, when anyone looks at me like that... I feel... responsible to be what they think of me. And I'm not really, I'm just... me. It's hard having people look up to you and adore you when they don't know you."

"Nobody expects you to be more than that - more than just you. At least I don't," I said.

Nick sighed.

"You do know this whole moody, brooding rocker thing went out, right?" I asked, smirking.

Nick laughed, a genuine laugh that reached his eyes and made them sparkle. "You're nuts," he said.

"I must be," I answered.

He flapped his arms and let out a sigh that indicated a topic change. "Anyway, I gotta go downtown, get some work done, got a meeting with Hugh. You know. Work stuff. I'll call ya later." He grabbed his phone off the coffee table.

"Have a good day," I offered.

"After the way it started, babe, I couldn't have a bad one if I tried," he answered with a wink. He slid his phone into his pocket, fluffed my hair with his fingers, and headed for the door. "Hey also, while I'm thinkin' about it, lemme leave you some cash... if you could run by the house real quick today, I need to pay the landscape artist and I don't really have time to go by and meet him. Could'ja do it?"

I nodded, "Sure," I said.

"Thanks," he smiled. "You're so helpful. You're like Siri." Nick laughed. He pulled out his wallet, threw a wad of cash onto the table, and repocketed the wallet. He started to turn to the door again, then stopped and turned back. "Oh... and tell him to make sure he gets the backyard el perfecto for the party. Can you believe that's only a few days away already?" he laughed, "It's sneaking up on us."

I nodded, "I know. Thank God it's not raining this weekend."

"Thank God indeed," Nick nodded. "Alright. See ya." He opened the door and disappeared outside into the sunlight.

I spent a good part of the next few hours day dreaming about that morning, to be completely honest. I mean, sex with Nick was that mind blowing that I had to actually process it, and even then I wasn't entirely positive I hadn't dreamed the whole affair. Maybe I'd just slept real late or something... So to prove to myself that it hadn't been a dream, I looked up Addison's GMA performance on YouTube. The video loaded and I watched it muted, thinking about Nick and the sex and everything when I spotted something.

I reversed the video a few frames and paused it and stared at it, leaning close to the computer to really get my eyes on it.

Addison had a tattoo.

But not just any tattoo.

It was a tattooed bracelet, a chain of birds in the various stages of flight, encircling her wrist and fading away up her inner forearm with the words Free to Fly in script among them. This tattoo was exactly like Cora's.

I blinked at it, wondering when she'd gotten it, why she'd gotten the same thing Cora had. I looked up on Google for Cora's tattoo, and compared the two of them. It really was almost exactly alike except for one small detail that, unless you were looking for it you'd never see: two of the birds had switched positions so that the wings seemed to flap out of tune on Addison's arm where they glided peacefully across Cora's.

I took a screen cap of the tattoo comparison and saved it in a folder. I don't even know what made me do it except that I wanted to show Nick later and see what he thought of it.

I decided it was time to head out to Nick's place to pay the landscape "artist" as he'd called him. I pocketed the cash Nick had left on the table and got in my car and drove across town. I stopped by the McDonalds for lunch on the way and was licking the salt off my fingers from the french fries as I pulled up to the gate.

As I drove through the little community staring at the various houses, it occurred to me that nobody was out washing their cars or playing in sprinklers like in a normal neighborhood, nobody was playing catch with their pets or their kids. It was like being in a Stepford neighborhood. No wonder Nick was staying at my place lately instead of going home.

His place was fucking depressing as shit.

When I pulled up to the big ass mansion overlooking the water, I spotted the landscape artist standing by a bush, running a weed whacker. He looked up as I pulled up behind his white van in the driveway and pulled a pair of headphones off as he turned off the weed whacker. He waved and walked across the lawn towards me.

"Hello," he called, wiping his hands on a full body jump suit he wore. It was dirty. "Who are you?" he asked, eyeballing me. He had a thick hispanic accent and his mouth was outlined with a goatee.

"I'm Samantha," I said, "Nick sent me to pay you..." I reached in my pocket and pulled out Nick's wad of cash. "Do you give him like a receipt or anything?" I asked.

The guy stared at me funny. "No," he said, "Of course not."

"Okay," I smiled. I looked around. "Nick wanted me to make sure you knew to get out back for the party this weekend," I said.

The guy nodded. "Of course I will," he said.

"Thanks."

He waved back at the bush, "I better get back to this, uh, weed whackin'. You have a good day, alright now?"

"Thanks," I waved and walked back to the car.

I was on the drive home when Nick called. "Did you get to pay the landscape artist?" he asked.

"I just left him," I answered. "Is he supposed to give you a receipt or anything? He said no but I just wanted to make sure."

Nick laughed, "No receipt. I'm good."

"When are you coming home tonight?" I asked.

"I'm actually headed to New York tonight," he replied. "I gotta sign a contract out there with this new producer at the label, you know?"

"Ohhh."

"I thought I told you about that. I'm sorry," he apologized. "I guess I got all caught up in...you know...this morning."

I blushed. "Yeah, this morning was... wow."

"It certainly was..." Nick chuckled. "I hope for a repeat soon?"

"Anytime," I said.

"I'll hold you to that," he said in a husky voice. Then, "Okay babe, I gotta go but I wanted to call and check in that everything got taken care of..."

"It did. Of course it did... I'm so helpful, remember?"

Nick laughed, "I'll never forget. Okay, you have a good night babe. I'll call you again later if I get a chance."

"Have a safe flight," I said.

"Thanks," he answered, and he hung up.

When I got home, I decided to spend the rest of the evening trying to find paparazzi trails of Addison getting Cora's tattoo. Something about it was bugging me, and I wanted to figure out why -- besides the obvious, I mean, of course.

Chapter Thirty-Seven


Nick was in New York for two days. During those two days, I tried to remember what I did before Nick came into my life, but almost everything involved Addison, and I found myself laying on my back on the couch watching the TV Nick had installed and eating everything in my fridge that wasn't healthy. Mostly the eating was because the only thing I could find on cable that was remotely interesting was reruns of Restraurant Impossible in which the guy with the weird accent says kew-cum-bah when he means cucumber.

I flickered through the channels at one point and came across an entertainment news cast. I realized after I'd changed the channel that I'd seen Addison, and I backed it up. She was coming out of the hugely iconic Macy's in the City carrying a bag and wearing dark sunglasses. She had her hand up in front of her face, her hair flowing behind her. They were talking about how she'd apparently signed a contract with the new producer the day before.

"Other artists signing on with the new producer include Cora Walters and Nick Carter of the Backstreet Boys..." The TV cut to an image of Nick and Cora - together - in an elevator as the doors closed out the press. I blinked at the screen. "The sudden death of Justin 'Z' Platt has turned the Music Industry upside down trying to find a replacement as good as the original..." the newscaster explained, "Virtually all of Hugh Walters' major clients are looking to replace ---" I turned the TV off and sat there in silence a moment, letting my head wrap around what I'd seen.

Nick and Cora. In an elevator. I'd forgotten completely that Cora and Addison were in New York, too. But of course they were, they were on GMA, weren't they? I felt conflicted. I wasn't sure what to think. I mean, it didn't neccessarily mean anything that they were in an elevator together. That elevator could've been anywhere, at the place where they signed the contracts, even. It didn't neccessarily have to be a hotel, didn't neccessarily mean that they were sleeping together or anything...

Though I'd be a liar if I tried to say I wasn't immediately filled with panic.

When Nick called almost an hour later, he didn't sound weird at all. He chatted normally, told me about the new producer whose name was Dawson and who had dreadlocks. "Honest to God dreads," he laughed. "You know I've always wondered if dreadlocks smell?"

"Smell?" I asked.

"Yeah. I mean, how the hell would you wash a dreadlock? The middle must get smelly, right?" he asked.

"I have no idea," I said, "I've never had dreadlocks."

"You'd look weird with dreadlocks," Nick snorted.

"Better than you would," I teased. I decided if I as gonna ask - now was the time to. "So... did you see Cora at all out there?" I asked, "She's in New York isn't she?"

Nick made a noncommittal sound. "It's a big city," he said.

"Yeah it is," I replied.

He paused. "Why?" I chewed the inside of my lips. "Sam?"

"You were on E news," I said quietly.

Nick paused, "E news?"

"Yes," I answered. "You and Cora in an elevator." Nick was quiet a moment too long and I knew. "You're a fucking bastard," I snapped and I hung up the phone.

I threw it across the couch and chucked a cushion at the TV. It hit the wall and fell to the floor with a soft thump. I heard the phone vibrating on the couch, but I stormed away, out into the dining room, into the kitchen, anywhere but near that phone.

I felt sick to my stomach, practically cross-eyed with anger. I scrubbed the kitchen floor.

When I checked my phone again a hour later, I had seventeen missed calls, nine voicemails, and twenty text messages. I sighed. I couldn't help but see snatches of the text messages content. Words like please, nothing happened, and explain filled the screen. I wasn't sure if I wanted to hear his explanation. I mean, I did but I didn't, too, at the same time. I wanted to hear it and believe it and go back to day dreaming about the other morning and thinking I was the luckiest damn girl in the world, but it made so much sense that he would be out there in New York, alone with Cora, and fall into old habits.

He was, after all, addicted to Cora.

He'd do anything for Cora.

The phone rang again as I sat there, and there was an almost pitiful feeling to the way it was ringing, like I could feel his resignation that I wouldn't answer it even as it rang. I know that's not possible, but it seemed that way.

I took a deep breath.

"What?" I asked coldly.

"Sam," he said, surprised to hear me answer, "Sam, please. I didn't mean to lie about seeing Cora. I only saw her for a second at the label. It wasn't anything. Please. I didn't wanna upset you. Nothing happened, I swear to God."

I sat quietly, listening to his breathing on the other end of the line.

"Sam," he begged, "Please believe me. Please."

I could feel my resolve weakening as his voice dipped into begging mode, could feel myself crumbling into letting him off the hook. "Nick..."

"Please," he begged. "What can I do to show you that nothing happened?"

What could he do, I wondered. I thought about it a moment, then I said, "Do you have any pictures of you and Cora both wearing your Journey shirts together?"

"What?" he asked, confused.

"You said you ordered the Journey shirts at the same time on the Internet. I want to see proof that there's two shirts and she didn't have your shirt that day."

There was a long pause. "Okay," he said.

"Send me that and I'll believe you."

"I don't know if that exists, though, I mean, we hardly ever wore them at the same time --"

"With the amount of paparazzi that follows Cora around it shouldn't be all that hard," I replied.

"But I mean we never were a public thing, you know?" he asked, "It's never been like that..."

"Well then you have your work cut out for you, don't you?" I asked.

He was quiet for a long moment. "Sam, I swear to you - on anything you want me to swear on - that nothing happened with me and Cora here in New York. We rode an elevator together, that's it. We stood like two feet apart the whole time. We barely even spoke."

I sighed.

"You gotta believe me," he pleaded.

"I mean I'm trying to," I said, "But I've been burned too many times."

"Sam --" he said, "I'm playing by the rules."

"What?"

"The rules," he said, "The ones you said that first night. I'm playing by the rules. I'm really trying here with you and me. It's different with us, you know? You really want to know me, you really give a crap, and I don't get that a lot. I'm not stupid enough to ruin that for some weekend fling with Cora."

I sighed. "Nick, I've been hurt enough in the past to know the signs and stuff, that's why I made the rules."

"I know but --"

"And to be completely honest, it's really hard to believe you because I know you. I mean you've been having an affair with her all this time behind everyone's backs, what's one more back?"

"Sam, you're not just one more back," he said. "I could do that to a hundred other girls, but not to you."

"Why?"

He was quiet a long moment. "Because, I know you'd Monk me out if I did."

"So you're just scared of getting caught."

"No that came out wrong. Shit, why I can't I ever say anything right, like how it sounds in my head, how I feel it?" he asked, frustration coming out in his voice.

"I don't know," I answered.

"It's 'cos I been editing myself for so damn long," he said, "Because I keep stuff locked up tight in me, isn't it? Like I trained myself not to be able to speak right about feelings because I don't want people to know'em most of the time and I'm so damn scared of saying things by accident that I'm locked up like Fort Knox."

"Maybe," I said.

"I don't wanna be Fort Knox anymore, Sam."

"I know."

"I'm so tired of secrets and lies," he said.

"I know."

Nick sniffed. "I just wish I knew how to be true easier," he said, "I wish it came more naturally, like it does for you." He paused, "But I'm trying... I'm trying."

"That's the most anyone can ask."

"Yeah," he said, "It is."

Chapter Thirty-Eight


­­I stressed over Nick and Cora and the shirts and the elevator so much I couldn't sleep that night. I kept waking up from these crazy dreams in which Cora and Nick just stood around laughing and pointing at me, amused by my gullibility. "Look at her," nightmare-Nick hooted once, "She thinks I'd pick her over you?" Then he stuck his tongue so far down Cora's throat it was like watching Gene Simmons get the last drop out of a bottle. I woke up and screamed into the dark room, tears on my cheeks and that was the end of my attempts at the REM cycle.

I ended up in the living room with my computer, flicking through the Internet, half looking for more proof that I wasn't crazy like Nick kinda-sorta made me feel about it.

Part of me wondered why I was surprised by this. After all, I met Nick after sitting in a bathroom listening as he slept with a married woman. I started working for him because he wanted to break apart that marriage so he could continue sleeping with said married woman. The idea that he'd cheat shouldn't be a shock at all. Once a cheater, always a cheater, right?

That's what they always said anyway.

But I felt like maybe, just maybe, he'd somehow... changed. I mean, would the Nick that I'd confronted in the hotel room ever have waited as long as he waited to have sex with me just because I'd made up some silly little rules? But what if Nick wasn't really playing by the rules? The thought made chills crawl up my spine and I quickly turned my attention to the computer screen, trying to distract myself.

It was in the process of distracting myself that I found some extremely interesting information.

The record company that Nick and Cora were visiting in New York City was one of the few foreign-owned labels that weren't owned by Hugh Walters. In fact, they were Hugh's biggest competition. But there was no way in hell that Cora could be switching labels. She was locked into a contract on Hugh's label - in fact, Cora was possibly his highest grossing contract on all of his labels combined.

This information was all up on TMZ, accompanied by a video of their reporters badgering Hugh on his way to his Porsche. Hugh had waved off the first few questions until a reporter shouted, "Do you think anything is going on between Nick Carter and your wife?"

Hugh looked up, fire in his eyes, his face nearly square with the camera. "There better fucking not be," he snarled.

"Would you kill Nick's contract?" asked another voice somewhere off screen.

Hugh turned toward them. "Why stop at the contract?" he said darkly, and then he turned and got into the Porsche amidst a frenzy of reaction.

I stared at the computer screen, dumbfounded, wondering if Hugh knew, and if he didn't know, how he didn't know... if that question would spark his realization... and whether Nick would be able to lie to him as smoothly as I suspected he was lying to me about the whole thing.

I kind of pictured Hugh driving to the airport and flying out to New York just to beat the living crap out of Nick, no questions asked.

A part of me wantd to go join him...

But Nick showed up on my door step two days later, fresh from New York (free of any beatings from Hugh, who didn't even leave LA). He held a big ol' envelope in his hand. He stared me in the eyes when I opened the door to his knocks and he held it out to me. "The proof you need," he said quietly.

My heart beat as I slid my finger under the flap of the envelope and pulled out a photo of Nick and Cora, both wearing their Journey t-shirts. I stared at the image.

"It ain't my shirt," he said.

I stared at the picture, a hundred million feelings racing through my body. Then I chucked it over my shoulder and it spun like a paper airplane through the air and landed under the table as I leaped forward and wrapped my arms around him, ecstatic just to have proof that I was just crazy and putting myself through anguish for the last two days for no reason at all.

Nick wrapped his arms around me and laughed as I started kissing his face like a wild woman. He guided me back into the house and kicked the door shut. I brought my palms up and touched his cheeks and stared into his eyes. "I'm sorry that I doubted you," I said, "I was just so scared."

"It's okay," he answered, "I understand."

"You wouldn't believe some of the shit I thought up," I said thickly.

"It's okay, babe," Nick replied.

I just felt so relieved to have a proof that my dreams were just that -- dreams -- and Nick wasn't really Gene Simmons-ing it up with Cora behind my back. I clung to him like I was glued, and before I knew it he was falling over me onto the couch, his eyes locked on mine, his body pressed against my body, our mouths consuming each other eagerly as the TV blinked and flashed across the room like a strobe light in the dark.

It wasn't until after, when we were sweat covered and laying pressed against one another in the dark, breathing heavily, that I got the opportunity to ask, "Why were you and Cora looking into signing with the other label?"

"Hmm?" Nick hummed.

"The company y'all were there to sign with? Why are you looking at new contracts?" I asked.

Nick's eyes were closed. He paused. "Why not?"

"Because you're both signed to Hugh's labels," I replied.

"It's never too late to change," he mumbled.

"Well I mean I don't care," I said, "it's not like it's my company or that I have any really vested interest either way. I'm just curious, that's all."

Nick shrugged, "New label's offering a better deal, that's all."

"So you signed it."

"Not yet."

"Why not?"

"Cora's gotta divorce Hugh first," Nick replied.

"Because he'll get pissed?" I asked.

"Because she legally can't work for another label until she's divorced from him, there's some stipulation about that - something about, like, I dunno, cross company spies or something," Nick replied. "I wasn't really paying attention when they were talkin' about it. She's considered a part owner of Hugh's labels because she's married to him and is beneficiary to it all if something happened to him."

"Seriously?"

Nick nodded.

"That's crazy."

"Right? But anyways, she can't sign a contract on the new label until everything with Hugh is taken care of."

"That makes sense."

Nick smiled.

"So she's getting a divorce now, huh?" I said. "Wasn't that what you hired me to do? Cause a divorce?" I laughed.

Nick laughed, too. "Funny how stuff works out, ain't it?"

"Extremely..." I smirked, "You finally don't give a damn and it happens."

"Right? What the hell kinda karma do I got?" he laughed.

"Apparently the bad kind," I said. I purred the word bad as I kissed his chin. "I could lay here all my life," I commented after a couple moments, my head against his chest, listening to the heart beats.

He ran his hand along my spine.

"You know what I want?" he asked thickly.

"Hmm?"

He pressed his cheek to mine, his mouth right against my ear. "I want you," he whispered, voice husky. "I want you all night long."

I pressed myself closer, "Yeah?"

"Yeah," he replied, kissing my forehead.

"But if we do it all night long you're gonna be tired for your big debut, Mr. Party Host," I said.

Nick smirked. "I think that's a fair trade off. Don't you?"

Chapter Thirty-Nine


The morning of the party dawned on Nick and I still entangled on the couch in the early morning sunlight. I liked this part of my day, where I got to just lay still and enjoy the features and shadows of his face and the way the light interacted with it. I always found myself thinking how gorgeous he was... Outside, a cloud shifted or something and the sunlight increased and lit up his face brilliantly, and before I could even finish thinking that he should sparkle or something, he moved, rolling over, and pitched me to the floor beside the couch. I landed on my elbow and let out a squeaky bark of response.

Nick sat up, blinked down at me, surprise on his face. He looked around the room, seemed to get his bearings, then dropped back onto the couch. "Shit," he muttered, "You okay?"

"Yeah," I replied, rubbing my now sore elbow.

He stared at me a moment from the corner of his eyes, sighed, and closed them. "Coffee," he pleaded.

"I'm out," I answered. I struggled to my feet and sat on the edge of the couch by his feet, "We'll have to go get some."

"Party," Nick mumbled. "Tonight." I nodded. He peeked out to look at me. "Exciting."

"It is," I answered.

He closed his eyes again. "I really want coffee..."

"You want me to go get some?" I asked.

He peeked at me again. "Would you?"

"Sure," I answered.

Nick grinned, "Thanks babe."

"No problem," I smiled. It only took me a couple minutes to change and I kissed his forehead on my way out the door, "I'll be right back," I said.

"Could'ja get bagels, too?" he asked, making puppy eyes at me. "Two? Mul--"

"--tigrain, I know," I said. "Be right back." I ducked out the door as Nick grinned and closed his eyes and settled back into the couch cushions.

Because Starbucks was only like a block and a half away, I decided to walk, since it was nice out and everything, and I made my way along the street, enjoying the sound my sneakers made on the pavement. I wondered if people passing me by on the street and looking at me could tell that I'd just woke up after a night of having incredible sex with a Backstreet Boy... I felt my cheeks flush at the thought.

The air conditioner was on freezing in Starbucks and I shivered as I stood in line behind some gossipy valley girls that were chattering away, clutching purses with tiny puppies like that was still a thing. They wore these spandex leggings that hugged their less-than-perfect curves with bright prints of Disney characters under frilly tutu things that made crunching noises when they moved.

I was mostly tuning them out, staring at the two multigrain bagels left in the case and praying that they didn't get purchased between now and when I got to the counter, when one girl whispered the name Hugh Walters and my attention was captured.

"...Hugh Walters pitching a fit, all ugly-crying," she laughed, "I wouldn't wanna be in Nick Carter's shoes right now, that's for sure."

I tried not to look like I was listening.

The second girl laughed, "It won't be the music world's biggest loss," she laughed.

"He used to be so cool 'til he started working with her," the first commented, "Then he just seemed to go mental or something. He comes in the bar a lot too. Maybe that's why Hugh was there."

"Hunting him down," the second laughed.

"Exactly! Although I guess he won't have far to look, talk of the town is some big shin-dig is being thrown down by Nick tonight. I'm sure something will go down there. Addison Mueller's playing it."

"That girl's such a slut."

"Right? I didn't think it was possible but she totally looks like Cora's slutty little sister or something."

"I heard she's like friends with that girl that Nick's seeing. Totally know how she got her record deal." She rolled her eyes. "It's not like she's that good at singing."

"She's better than Cora."

"Fingernails on chalkboard is better than Cora."

They both laughed and the barista motioned for them to step up to the counter. My hands were shaking I was so irritated but I kept my mouth shut. I watched as they ordered skinny mochas and the damn multigrain bagels. As if I couldn't have hated them more... When I got to the counter I said, "I will pay you twenty dollars for those two bagels. That's a thousand percent increase."

He stared at me. "What?"

"Those two multigrain bagels those girls just bought? I'll pay you $20 for them."

He blinked in surprise, glanced at the girls, who'd been quite rude to him, and handed me the bag. I shoved the twenty into the tip jar and took the two cups of coffee I'd ordered and smiled at the girls, who were clueless that I was carrying their bagels as I passed by them to the doors.

When I got back to the house, Nick was in my shower and I put the bagels and coffee on the table and sat down to see if I coul find out what they'd been talking about with Hugh, but there wasn't much of anything other than some paparazzi photos of him leaving a bar completely shitfaced less than twelve hours before. There was nothing anywhere about Nick other than the comments from the day the video of Nick and Cora getting on the elevator in New York had leaked all over the Internet.

When Nick came out he laid into the bagels with passion and drank his coffee in what seemed like a single sip. He glanced over my shoulder, "What'cha lookin' up Hugh for?" he asked, chewing.

"There was some girls talkin' about him at Starbucks," I answered, "I was just curious what was up, that's all."

"What about him?"

I shrugged. "I don't know. He was drunk last night at a bar."

"Oh," Nick said. He continued chewing on his bagel.

"You know it's getting around that you and Cora are a thing because of the elevator shot, right?" I said, "You know Hugh's pissed, don't you?"

Nick laughed, "Hugh ain't pissed."

I pulled up the video. Nick stared at the computer long after Hugh Walters had finished saying - in so many words - that he'd kill Nick if he found out Nick was seeing Cora. "Yeah well, I'm not seeing her, so it's moot." He turned away, though I could see nervousness in his eyes and mannerisms as he sat down and grabbed the second bagel from the bag.

"You really think Hugh Walters stops to ask questions about whether he's right or not?" I asked, raising my eyebrow. "He seems more of an act-on-the-moment kind of guy." I paused. Then something occurred to me. I turned to Nick, "Oh my God. Nick. What if -- Oh my God."

"What?" he looked confused.

"What if Hugh Walters did kill Z?"

Nick choked on bagel and laughed. "Z was his number one producer. His labels are suffering from Z's death, not blossoming. All the idiots saying that they think he killed Z on the web don't know what they're talking about. Hugh would have to be stupid to kill Z... he was his number one grossing producer and song writer."

"Yeah but if he thought that Z was seeing Cora, like I did ---"

"Hugh knows Z is gay."

"But it makes sense, doesn't it? He finds out Z is having an affair with his wife, he reacts poorly, kills the guy and doesn't know what to do so he just stages a suicide and hides behind the fact that Z raked in a lot of cash for him. It makes sense."

"Maybe."

"I think it does," I said.

Nick shrugged. He crumpled the now empty $20 bagel bag and stood up. "I dunno. Either way, we should head over to my place so we're there while everyone's settin' up for tonight. And we can get ready."

"Okay." I closed down my computer. While the thing was shutting down, I said, "Hugh's coming tonight, though, isn't he?"

"Course," Nick answered. "He's one of the guests of honor isn't he?"

"Well yes, but --"

Nick laughed, "Babe, he's not gonna kill me. Relax. He doesn't know about me and Cora, and even if he did, that's over."

"He doesn't know that," I argued.

"Of course he does," Nick laughed, "I'm with you aren't I?" He smirked, "You're like my little alibi." He leaned down and kissed my cheek. "I gotta pee," he said when he'd finished kissing my skin softly. "Be right back." And he walked away.

I sighed and finished the last of my coffee. All I could do was hope he was right and he wasn't about to become Z's mystery killer's next victim.

Chapter Forty


When we got to Nick's place, it was already abuzz with vendors waiting to deliver and set up. Nick grinned as he settled into the chairs on the deck and watched, pulling his sunglasses onto his face and reclining the chair back so he was in the direct sunlight. I imagie it must've been interesting, like watching the Whos in Whoville prepare for Christmas or something. I wouldn't know because as everyone set up, I scrambled around with a clipboard making sure everyone knew what they were doing and where things were going to create the wonderland of a party that Nick had envisioned from the beginning.

"The balloon archs need to be centered on either end of the pool from the staging," I said, waving the balloons guys back from each other. I caught a caterer setting up a table between two dolphin shaped statues - "No, no, not there. Over there. By the deck there... OI!" My eyes had caught sight of a guy trying to run a neon orange extension cord across the freshly mowed lawn, "What's with the freakin' eyesore wire?" He waved at the speakers. "Get a green one!" I yelled. He grumbled and walked away.

Nick grinned as I sat down with a heavy sigh of exhaustion as the vendors all scurried around. I closed my eyes and smacked the clipboard to my forehead. "Jesus Christ, could they hire stupider people for these jobs?" I moaned.

Nick laughed. "You're brilliant," he said.

"Yeah, well, any time you feel like coming out there and taking some of the duty, feel free, Mr. Cabana Boy."

"I'd just get in the way. Nobody takes it seriously when I yell at them," he said. "That's why I don't keep help around here."

"What about your landscaper?"

Nick looked confused for just a second. "Oh. Yeah, him. He's different. He barely speaks English." Nick turned and grabbed a Pepsi that had appeared at his elbow at some point while I was running around commanding the delivery guys.

"Just admit you're a lazy ass diva and get it over with," I said, shaking my head.

Nick grinned.

I looked up just as the sound system guy was rolling the orange extension cord across the lawn again. "Fucking hell," I groaned, "I just told him not to use that one." I leaped to my feet and rushed across the deck. "What did I say about that damn orange cord!" I yelled.

"It's the only one that'll stretch," he answered.

"So use two green ones stuck together!"

"That's four cords!"

"Do you know whose party this is?" I demanded, folding my arms across my chest.

The guy sighed and rolled the cord back up again and went back to his truck.

Nick clapped from his seat. "See, why the hell would I get up when I can just watch you boss these guys around? It's a good show."

"Why I oughtta---"

"Where do you want the light rigging?" a vendor called.

I pointed at Nick. "You just wait. I'll be back to get you."

He cheesed. "I look forward to that."

I wanted to make some smart ass remark, but the twinkle in his eyes all but turned my knees to jam and I knew if I tried it'd only come out sounding stupid so all I did was give him the Keeping-My-Eyes-On-You hand motion before I hustled off to finish the prepping of the party grounds process.

It was close to five o'clock when everything was set up and the lights were on. Balloons crowded the grass, colored spotlights lit up the dolphins, stringlights crisscrossed over the pool, the deck was a menagerie of delicious smelling foods being heated up by the caterers, a champagne fountain and a couple guys dressed like penguins with stacks of champagne flutes waited to the side. The DJ was sound-testing the equipment and I was running my finger over and over my check list when Nick came up behind me and slid his arms around my waist.

"You've done it perfectly," he said thickly into my ear, "Everything is beautiful. You're amazing."

"I feel like I'm forgetting something," I muttered, rereading my checklist again.

"You haven't," Nick argued. "It's perfect." He grabbed the list out of my hands, and kissed my mouth as I turned to protest. "Shh," he commanded. "It's time to get you ready. C'mon." He pulled me across the lawn and into the house, tossing my clipboard onto the counter. We went up stairs and he led me into his bedroom, which I'd never been in. The room was huge, with a California King-sized bed installed with a wall-length picture window view of the ocean. It had a canopy and -- you gotta be kidding me -- a mirror over the bed.

I pointed. "How 50 Shades of you," I commented.

Nick grinned.

I ran my hand over his bed. The sheets were the softest sheets I ever felt in my life. "How do you get up in the morning?" I asked.

"Sometimes I don't," he confessed.

I crawled onto the bed and laid down. "Jesus this was a mistake," I groaned. "I'm gonna have to skip the party. I'm gonna just lay here and pretend I'm in a god-damn cloud instead."

Nick laughed. He came over and crawled onto the bed next to me. "Wanna test out that mirror?" he asked in a low, throaty voice.

I laughed, "Do we have time?"

"There's always time for Jello," he mumbled, and he kissed me, falling across me.

"Room," I muttered into his mouth as his hands pushed my shirt up. "There's always room for Jello."

"Fuck Jello," he muttered back into my mouth.

I laughed, "I can't fuck Jello, I'm fucking you."

"Mmm, yes you are."

A half an hour later and my hair looked like a bird had tried to nest in it and he was covered in sweat and we were laying there breathless.

"Guess we should get ready for the party now, huh?" I panted.

"Yeah, probably," Nick panted back.

I stared up at him in the mirror. He looked so damn sexy. He grinned, catching my eye in our reflection. "Hi there," he said.

"Hi," I replied.

"You're sexy," he said. He smiled, and rolled to look into my eyes.

"No I'm not."

He shook his head, "You really are." He brushed my hair behind my ear. "What in hell do you see in me?" he asked, and his eyes clouded.

I couldn't believe he was asking me that. "What?" I asked, a laugh catching in my throat. "What do you mean?"

"I mean... What do you possibly see in me? I'm kind of a tool."

"Kind of?"

"No seriously." Nick sighed. He rolled onto his back again. "You really love me, don't you? Do you know how much that blows my mind?"

"Lots of people love you."

"Not me, but you seem to for God only knows what reason."

"You're sweet, you're gentle, you're respectful, you're thoughtful, you're good." I reached over and turned his head to face me, "You're kind."

Nick blinked up at me. He drew a deep breath, "I wish those things were true," he said, "But sometimes I'm so far from being any of those things that it hurts me to think of you thinking I am those things."

I shook my head. "I believe in you," I said, "And what you've been in the past doesn't matter to me. It's what you are now, who you choose to be in the future."

Nick swallowed. "Do we have choices?"

"Of course we do," I replied. "We all do."

Nick closed his eyes and hmmm-ed quietly. "I guess we'll see."

I laughed, "Guessing isn't choosing. It's guessing. You have to choose." I kissed his nose. "You're a good guy. Believe it. Choose it." I looked at the clock. "For now, we gotta choose to get dressed or all your guests are gonna show up and find us naked in bed."

"Like John and Yoko," Nick laughed.

"Mmhm," I nodded, and crawled off the bed.

He caught my wrist as I started to walk away. "You really believe I have a choice to be good?" he asked.

I paused. "You already are good," I said, shaking my head, "You have a choice to see that and believe it for yourself or not. That's your choice."

Nick watched me as I went over to the closet door where he'd hung up the two garment bags that held his suit and my dress and I unzipped the bag and pulled the soft green material down from the hanger. "Thank you," he said.

"For?"

"Everything," Nick said.

"No problem, Nick." I smirked. "I expect a good Christmas bonus, that's all."

Nick laughed.

Chapter Forty-One


There ain't no party like a Backstreet party 'cos a Backstreet party don't stop. There ain't no party like a Nick Carter party 'cos a Nick Carter party don't stop... The DJ shouted this mantra into his mic at random intervals. The backyard was like a club. The beat of the bass line seemed to throb through the grass and the water seemed to jump in reply to it. People were everywhere. Every surface of Nick's backyard had someone perched on it. It was a star studded crowd, too, even though Cora, Addison, and Hugh had yet to show up. And it wasn't just the four other Backstreet Boys that stood out among the faces, either (although they were all accounted for before an hour had passed). I'd spotted several people I recognized - names ranging from Pink to Seth Rogan to Kaley Cuoco to Dr. Phil to one of the little boys from One Direction. And there were plenty of regular people mixed in,t too. The crowd throbbed with energy.

Nick was playing the part of host perfectly. He stood at the top of the steps like he was Jay Gatsby, welcoming every person that streamed through the flung-wide french doors of the house, grinning and bowing and calling out salutations from his perch. He looked stunning, too, in that perfect black suit that fit him like it had been specially tailored for his shape. His hair was slicked back a little, his eyes darting around the yard 'til he spotted me, and a grin passed over his mouth as he waved a couple finger tips my direction to say hi.

I waved back.

Everything was going so perfect. People seemed to be enjoying themselves. I couldn't help but feel like I'd really done something to be proud of in organizing the whole event myself, and I took a flute of champagne and thanked the penguin-looking waiter that'd offered it to me, my nervous energy finally releasing for the first time since I'd started the project of party planning.

I was just beginning to think that the whole thing would go off without a hitch when a general murmur rippled through the party and everyone seemed to turn all at once as Cora walked through the French doors. She commanded attention in a flaming red dress that fell to the floor in what looked like streamers of orange and red shades. She looked like a living phoenix with her dark brown hair pulled violently back from her face, giving her sharp features a beaky appearance. Her eyeshadow curled away from the outer edges of her eyes into a flame pattern and she had the reddest lipstick that I'd ever seen. It was over the top, it was beautiful, it was Cora. It was everything I wished I could be, minus the pure evil that I'd come to associate with her since meeting Nick. There was a time that Addison and I would've poured over magazine photos from this event, oohing and ahhing at her, though, and that part of me couldn't help but ooh and ahh even now.

Cora took two steps down toward the pool before Addison came out in her wake. And the murmur that had rippled through with Cora's appearance regenerated as Addison came into view. I couldn't help but gasp at the sight of her.

Addison had on a purple and neon green dress that was so tight it probably had to be painted on. The bodice was purple, but directly under her breasts it turned neon green that just barely reached her thighs. She had on a pair of heels fashioned to look like Converse sneakers that matched the purple of the bodice and her long hair was pinned back with a neon green flower on the side. She wore vitually no make-up, maybe some lip gloss, but she was absolutely breathtaking without it.

People were still talking and stealing glances as Cora and Addison approached Nick, who was still acting as host. They hardly noticed Hugh walk through behind the two ladies in a pinstripe suit. I beelined it over to Nick's side as Hugh made his way toward the cluster of popstars.

"--glaad you could make it, you both look good," Nick was saying in a stiff voice.

"So sorry we're late," Cora said thickly. She stared up at Nick, a sultry expression on her face, her bright red lips puckered into a pout. "It takes time to make old things like us beautiful, you know."

"I doubt it," Nick replied as I reached his hip. I laced my arm through his and he looked at me and smiled, then turned to Cora, "You remember Samantha... and you do, I believe, anyway, Addison, don't you?" he asked pointedly.

"Hey," Addison said.

"Hey," I answered.

Hugh cut between the two of them, and Cora shifted to glare up at him when he wasn't looking. Addison nodded and took the remaining steps into the party. Part of me wanted to cut out and follow her, but I wanted to see Hugh, too, and be there to protect Nick.

He held out his hand to Nick. "Welcome back to Los Angeles," Hugh said in his booming voice. He stared down at Nick - a feat acheived by unreal height - and took Nick's hand in his own. Nick's hand looked like a kids' compared to Hugh's. "I hear you may have a new record deal soon," he said.

Nick shrugged, "I didn't like the deal I was offered," he said. "I just let them woo me. You know I wouldn't leave, Hugh, Walters Records is my home." He smiled.

Hugh eyed him.

"But why not let the Sweed buy me lunch while I'm given the opportunity, huh?" he smirked. "You know all about taking up opportunities, don't you, Hugh?"

"Only when they are the most beneficial," Hugh replied. They were still shaking hands. It was getting tense. Hugh pulled Nick closer suddenly and leaned down so that his voice was directly in Nick's ear. He spoke softly in an attempt to keep anyone else from hearing, but I heard him, if only barely. "If I find out you fucked my wife, I will kill you," he said, and he released Nick, who literally stumbled back as he was all but dropped.

Nick struggled to regain composure and he smiled tightly, laughed like he'd been told something friendly and humorous. "I know what you're saying man, I know." He somehow managed to get his eyes to sparkle. "And I respect that."

Hugh tapped the side of his nose. He meant business. And he looked at me. "Aren't you ravishing," he muttered, "You clean up well." And he turned and took the steps, looking around the party with his hands shoved into his pockets. Cora glanced at Nick, the sultry eyes returning, then took the steps as well, a tiny smirk playing on her lips.

"What in hell does that mean?" I demanded, "You clean up well?"

But instead of answering, Nick turned and sat down on the nearest chair. He loosened his tie with shaking hands.

"Are you okay?" I asked, concerned.

"I feel like I'm gonna throw up," he said. He looked around as though trying to determine where to do so.

"C'mon," I said, taking his hand and pulling him into the house.

"But I'm the host..."

"The party will survive for thirty seconds without a host, don't worry." I pulled him into the kitchen and set him down on a stool. I wet a paper towel in the sink and wrung it out and pressed it to his forehead. I got him a can of ginger ale from the fridge.

Nick licked his lips, "I don't know what I was thinkin'," he muttered, shaking his head, eyes closed, "I don't know what I was thinkin'..."

"About what?" I asked, popping the can open and sitting next to him as he ran the paper towel over his eyes and nose and cheeks. He was sweating, I could see the glistening on his neck that told me so. He covered his face with the damp cloth. "Nick," I reached out a hand and touched his arm, "What's wrong?"

"I just -- I can't --" Nick choked over words and I realized he was crying. He covered his face with his hands, the papertowel stretched beneath them. "...stupid... it just... choice..." Nick was choking over words, muttering, breaking up.

I reached over and rubbed his shoulders. "Honey it's gonna be okay..." I said quietly.

"Not like it should be," he choked out.

"What's not like it should be? The party? Is there something I can fix?"

He was shaking his head, "It's too late to fix it," he muttered.

"It's never too late," I answered.

Nick shook his head.

"Nick," I said. I grabbed his chin and turned his face up to look at me. "It is never too late."

He stared into my eyes, tears threatened to continue falling from his, and for the first time since I'd known him, I saw something in his eyes, something I couldn't quite put a word to... Clarity? Maybe regret? His breath came out ragged.

"Here... drink this." I handed the ginger ale to him, and as he sipped, I said, "Don't let Hugh Walters bully you. You didn't sleep with Cora in New York, you said, right? So there's nothing to worry about with him."

"I didn't sleep with her in New York," Nick said thickly, lowering the can of soda he'd gulped down half of, "But I have before New York. You know that, you know about the hotel and the night with the condoms and --" he shook his head. He looked away. He put the can down on the counter, but almost missed and I caught it at the last moment before it would've spilled to the floor. "God," he whispered. "What in hell was I ever thinking, falling for Cora in the first place, daring to go against a guy like Hugh Walters? And for something so... superficial... It isn't even love. She doesn't love me. She never has, and she wouldn't ever, would she?" He looked up at me. "But you... you do."

"I do," I said, nodding.

He swiped the back of his hand over his eyes. His perfectly slicked hair fell across his eyes as he stared down. He took a deep breath, and I could hear the weight of the world rattling around inside him. He opened his eyes and stared up at me. "If you'd just been in my life sooner, Sam, things would be so different," he said, and he stood up and walked out the doors, leaving me puzzling and staring after him, holding a half drank can of ginger ale.

Chapter Forty-Two


Nick was no where to be found out in the party crowd when I stepped through the french doors and looked around. People were everywhere, in the pool and all over the lawn. A crew was setting up a microphone and the lights were being turned toward the stage. Addison was standing to one side while someone touched up her make-up. I started down the steps to go talk to her when Hugh said suddenly, "Looking for something?"

I turned to see him standing a couple feet away, by the food table, holding a plate of Nick's coveted dumplings. He stuck one in his mouth.

"I was just going to go talk to my friend, if that's okay with you."

Hugh looked surprised by the aggression in my voice. "Oh dear," he muttered, "It does sound like I've rather offended you somehow." He put the plate down and dusted his fingers on a hankerchief that he pulled from his breast coatpocket. "Come, talk to me," he said, "I don't like leaving any lady unsatisfied, particularly when they look as beautiful as you." He grinned.

I took a step back away from him. "I'm going to talk to my friend, thank you." I started down the steps again.

"You know he's off somewhere with her again don't you?" Hugh said darkly from behind me.

I stopped and turned. "What?"

"Nick," he spat the name. "He's off somewhere again with Cora. With my wife." Hugh followed me down the steps until he was actually a couple steps below me and we were eye-to-eye. "You and I, we have a lot more in common than you seem to think. I understand that, for whatever reason, you seem to have some kind of issue against me, but you and I... we're in a very similar situation, Miss. Samantha."

"And what situation is that?"

"We're both blindly, recklessly in love with two people who couldn't give a rats ass about anything other than themselves and the things that further their own interests and gain." He laughed and shook his head, "And we know this about them, you and I do, yet we still overlook it, still let them trample over us..." He paused, "You know they're upstairs right now? Probably fucking all over his bed..." Hugh's eyes twinkled, "The bed you fucked him on right before we all got here, I'm guessing."

I felt a shiver go down my spine and in spite of myself I glanced back at the house, at Nick's huge picture window. I looked back at Hugh. "He's not," I said.

"I think he is," Hugh said, "I think he is, and I'm fed up with letting myself get walked on. If you had any sense in that pretty little head of yours you'd be fed up, too." Hugh shook his head, "You're too stupid to see that you're nothing to him."

"I'm not stupid," I snapped.

"Pathetic, desprate little bitch," Hugh muttered, "Giving the coward something to hide behind, like I'm stupid enough to believe he'd love someone as homely as you. Whatever the dress might do for you, you've still got that ugly face... I know better than to think Nick would ever be with you. You're nothing but the mirrors and smoke he's using to keep his little affair out of the public eye. But he fucked up in New York, didn't he? Let his guard down, since I wasn't around." Hugh's mouth curled into a hideously Grinch-like grin. "But I'm not going to be deceived as easily as you are." He turned and started up the steps.

My heart was searing. The words he'd said cut deep. I felt like my emotions were bleeding from every pore of my body. I turned and I raced up the steps around him, gathering my skirt in my hand and I cut in front of him so that we were on eye-level once more and, with every ounce of anger, stress, frustration, and hatred that coursed through my veins, I slapped Hugh Walters across the face so hard it was sure to leave a mark.

People around us that heard the crack of my skin against his turned and looked, Addison among them. "Don't you fucking dare talk to me like that," I snarled. "You'd be damn lucky to lose Cora, she's not anything special. Maybe she's got a pretty, pretty face but that's all she is. Inside she's just a repulsive, vile witch. And if you had any sense you'd thank your lucky stars you have a reason to leave her. But Nick, he's got a heart, he's got a soul, and if Cora isn't done trying to suck it out of him before she moves on to her next victim, then that's my choice to forgive him for that. But I swear to God, Hugh Walters, if you lay a single finger on Nick because you're trying to protect your pride and stroke your ego, then you've got me to answer to, and trust me --- you don't wanna fuck with me." I gathered every ounce of courage I had, which honestly wasn't a lot, and threw it into the bluff as I puffed myself up in front of him and the people turning to look at us.

Hugh Walters and I stared each other down. Intense energy moved between us, tension so thick it felt like a brick wall was between us. Finally, with a grunt, Hugh turned around...and went the other way. My muscles seemed to turn to jelly and I dropped to sit on the steps. I heard a ripple of conversation move through the crowd, and Addison, whose eyes were widely staring at me from across the party, shook herself to regain composure as Hugh approached her himself.

"Oh God," I muttered. I couldn't believe I'd just faced down Hugh like that. I looked back up at the window, wondered if he was right about Nick and Cora, and I struggled to my feet. As much as I hated that I was questioning it, I needed to know. I needed to find Nick. Or Cora at least. Hopefully not together.

I stepped into the house, my knees and hands still shaking from my confrontation with Hugh Walters, and headed up the steps as quickly as I could. I pushed open Nick's bedroom door without a moment's hesitation, determined to catch them in the act if I was going to catch them, but the room was dark and the bed was empty, still messy from Nick and I, our empty garment bags still strewn across it.

In the hallway, I went door to door, pushing open doors on guest bedrooms, two separate bathrooms, closets, a home recording studio, an office, and what looked like an upstairs den. But Nick and Cora were in none of the rooms, though a random couple had found their way into the shower where they'd squealed in protest when I pulled back the shower curtain to confirm it wasn't Nick.

After about twenty minutes of searching through the house, I went back out to the party, breathless from my ranting run through the upstairs, a little ashamed that I'd doubted him at all.

As I stepped out onto the deck, my eyes swept the party, sure that he'd be out there. The DJ was just announcing Addison was going to perform and a cheer went up and the lights flashed at the stage mid-pool and I realized that Hugh Walters, too, was missing, and I started down the steps.

I was halfway down them when Nick caught me by the elbow.

The throbbing music of Addison's song burst from the speakers and shook the ground we stood on as Nick leaned close to my ear. "Where have you been?" he shouted, "I've been looking for you for like ten minutes!"

"I was looking for you," I replied, "I was inside. I thought you were inside."

"I was down by the beach," he replied, waving an arm at the water.

"Hugh thought you were inside," I said. "He thought you were fucking Cora. He couldn't find her. Nick, he's pissed."

"I heard you were fighting with him," Nick said, "Someone said you slapped him?"

"He's an asshole, Nick," I said. "I think he killed Z."

Nick's eyes were intense. "Sam," he said, "He didn't kill Z."

"Nick, he's on the warpath. If I hadn't stopped him just now, I think he would've killed you," I blurted out. "He's dangerous, he's insane, he's --"

Nick held up his hands, stopping me mid-sentence. "Sam..." He took a deep breath. "You canont tell anybody what I am about to tell you. Not ever. Do you understand me?"

I nodded.

Hair hung in his eyes as he leaned down to talk to me. He paused. Hesitated. There was a moment when I thought he was going to say something and then he stopped and licked his lips. He seemed to struggle for a moment, then he said, "Hugh Walters is dead."

I blinked in surprise. "What?"

"Dead," Nick said. "Hugh Walters is dead."

Chapter Forty-Three


The world was spinning. I saw blurs and flashes of color but whether they were the stuff of dreams or reality I'm unsure. I just know everything felt like it was tilting first one way and then the other and back again, and I was feeling like a seasick sailor. It was the seasickness that woke me, and I rolled over, trying to steady myself. The light on the ceiling took a moment to fade in and out of view, my eyes trying to focus on it, before finally it snapped into place. It was immediately obscured by Addison.

"Oh thank God!" she gasped.

"Addie?" my voice sounded frog-like.

Suddenly I was hurtled upward into Addison's arms, my face pressed into her neck, and she hugged me tight. "You had me scared to death," she whimpered.

"I... I did? I..." I looked around, "What... what happened?"

"I'm not entirely sure," she said, "But I have a theory."

"Well any theory is welcome right now. I have no idea how I got here. The last thing I remember, I was at Nick's party and he had just told me that --" I stopped short. My heart slammed in my chest.

Hugh Walters is dead.

"I was on stage, and I looked over and I suddenly saw you, completely wasted, screaming and rambling about God knows what... then after my set, I ran over because, I mean, you obviously needed help... and I didn't know where Nick had one off to, but I got Hugh and --"

"Hugh?" I said, looking up. "Wait, what?"

"Hugh, you know -- Hugh Walters? He helped me load you into a taxi."

I stared at Addison. "But -- Hugh Walters helped load me into a cab?"

Addison nodded. She gave me a funny look.

"But... but Nick said --" and then I remembered I wasn't supposed to tell anyone ever what he said. I felt like I'd been mind-fucked.

"What did Nick say?" Addison looked confused.

"Maybe it was a dream," I muttered, more to myself than to her. She was cocking her head like an inquisitive dog. I looked at her. "Addie, are you sure it was Hugh that helped?"

"Yeah..." she looked at me like I had seven or eight heads growing off my shoulders.

I strained and vaguely remembered a booming, familiar voice saying, "its time you went home," but it didn't make sense... "Addie," I said, breaking my promise, "Nick told me Hugh Walters was dead."

Addison's eyes registered surprise, "When?"

"Last night. Before I drank. He told me I should leave because I'd been seen fighting with him earlier and he was dead."

"But he put you in the cab after that so obviously that's not right," Addison said, her eyebrows cinching together.

"But why would Nick say that?"

"Maybe you dreamt it."

"But I wasn't drunk when he said it," I argued.

"Are you sure?"

"I'm positive," I replied. "I only drank one flute of champagne before that and to be honest I didn't even finish that because you and Cora and Hugh arrived and Nick had a little bit of a breakdown in the kitchen and I misplaced my glass."

"A break down?"

"Hugh confronted him about sleeping with Cora," I explained, "Right after you left, Hugh pulled him up, got right in his face, and threatened to kill him if he found out that he'd been with Cora..." my mouth went dry. "Oh fucking hell, I need to call Nick."

"Why?"

"I need to see if he's okay, if Hugh's alive then I need to make sure Nick is alive... Hugh was pissed, he was ready to go in the house and kill Nick last night, that's what I fought with him about on the steps..."

Addison's eyes were wide. "They're all psychotic," she muttered.

"What?"

"Hugh, Nick, Cora... they're all fucking psychotic," she said. Suddenly Addison's eyes filled with tears. "Sam, I'm so sorry I've been a bitch. I'm sorry I left you when you needed me most. I'm sorry. I just got so... caught up... in fame, in Cora, in lies." She shook her head. "Sam, I think Cora and Nick are up to no good though. I know you're in love with him, and I know you think he loves you back, but Sam, I don't know. I don't think he's in it for the right reasons. I don't know what exactly, but they're not into anything good."

"Why?"

"They met up in New York and we went to this record company and Nick kept arguing with Cora if it was a good idea or not because there were pictures being taken of us all there and he said that people might catch on if they were seen switching labels."

"Catch on to what?" I asked, confused.

"I don't know," Addison replied.

"Did he sleep with her?" I asked, afraid of the answer.

"They were never alone," Addison said. "I was there the entire time. But Cora kept asking questions about you and I could tell Nick was uncomfortable."

"What kinds of questions?"

"Just, you know, if he'd slept with you, if he was with you or if you were his assistant, those kinds of things," Addison answered.

"What'd he say?"

"He usually answered with something cryptic, like you know me or I told you what she is to me and things like that."

I felt sick. I suddenly felt supremely, royally, colossally blindsided. Tears sprang to my eyes, I could feel them burning, begging to escape. "What in hell have we landed in the middle of?" I choked.

"I don't know," Addison said.

"I need to call Nick," I said, "I gotta find out if I dreamt that, if he's okay, what the hell is going on..." I struggled to my feet and Addison followed me out into the hallway to the living room where the TV was on, muted, and my purse was laying on the couch. I grabbed my bag and rooted for my cell phone. I had a couple missed calls from Nick blinking and flashing. I was staring at my phone, typing in the passcode when Addison let out a shriek and dove for the remote control.

The volume turned up.

"This just in, more news on the developing story coming out of West Hollywood near Malibu where authorities say they've identified the body of music business mongrel, Hugh Walters, husband of Pop Queen Cora Walters. Walters was found this morning a quarter mile down the beach from Nick Carter's home, where he was attending a party premiering pop's newest princess, Addison Mueller. Walters was shot twice in the back, authorities say, but no weapon was found in the area. Experts are working on testing ballistics to identify the gun and trace it back to its registered owner. We'll keep you updated on this tragic, developing story."

I froze holding the phone in my hands.

Addison looked over at me, eyes wide. "Sam," she said, her voice shaking, "How in hell did Nick know Hugh Walters was dead before Hugh Walters was dead?" she asked.

I was too numb to answer.

Chapter Forty-Four


This is Nick, leave a voicemail.

"Nick. Call me. It's Sam."

I immediately redialed. For the fourth time. My heart was jackhammering against my rib cage. Addison and I stood there in the center of the living room, staring at each other with wide, terrified expressions on our faces. I could feel my nervous system tightening and releasing as my stomach churning.

This is Nick, leave a voicemail.

"I need to go over there," I said, hanging up the phone and redialing for the sixth time.

Addison's eyes widened even further, "Sam, what if he killed Hugh Walters?" she croaked.

"Nick wouldn't --" I stammered, but even as I argued her, Addison's point seized hold of my mind and I realized it was the only thing that really made sense... I shoved it out of my brain. No, I thought, no way would Nick kill Hugh. I mean he didn't get along with him, for obvious reasons, but Nick was way too terrified of Hugh when we'd talked in the kitchen. He wouldn't have tried to go head-on with him, would he? And wouldn't they have checked Nick out first, the authorities, if they'd even supsected it was possible that it had been him?

Addison took a deep breath, "Sam, Nick's done a lot of things you think he wouldn't do, I'm betting."

"No Addie, he wouldn't kill Hugh Walters," I said, almost pleading.

"Sam, I think Nick put something in your champagne last night," she said in a hurried tone.

"What?"

"Nick put something in the champagne flute you drank from last night. I saw him do it. He told the waiter to deliver it to you right after he left talking to you. There was only one flute on that tray. And I saw him messin' with that flute, Sam," Addison argued.

I ran my hands over my face. I felt overloaded. "Why would he do that? Why would he tell me Hugh Walters was dead, then spike my drink?" I asked. I shook my head, "It doesn't make sense, Addie. I feel like the answer is right in front of me, but I can't.... grasp it... or... something." I grabbed my purse. "C'mon. We need to go check on Nick."

"Sam... I'm scared," Addison said thickly.

"It's going to be ok," I answered.

Addison shook her head, "We can't go over there. What if he did do it? What if he panics and kills us the moment we walk up to the door?"

"Nick wouldn't ---"

"SAM! Aren't you listening! Are you blind? Nick did this, Nick spiked your champagne. He's lying to you about everything but you're still defending him?"

I stood by the door, clutching my purse, the phone ringing and ringing, waiting for Nick to answer. I thought it all through, thought about what if Addison was right, what if Nick had killed Hugh, what if he'd spiked my drink, what if he'd killed Z, what if he'd done it all in the name of loving Cora? Tears filled my eyes. But even as it broke my heart to think of Nick as the bad guy in all of this, I knew I couldn't hate him, whatever he'd done. I'd seen him too vulnerable, and I knew that despite everything, if he had done it all just as Addison said, that he needed me to help him through it because deep down, at the core of him, he really was a good person.

"I am," I answered, "I'll defend him to the end, Addie." I took a deep breath. "Are you coming with me or are you staying here?"

Addison grabbed her own purse and shaking her head followed me out the door and to the car. She snatched my keys as I was unlocking the door. "Give me that," she said, "You're not driving. You've been passed out drunk and drugged all night, you're in no shape to drive."

"Thank you," I said.

Addie shook her head, "I don't want you dead. Which is why I seriously am questioning our sanity for doing this in the first place."

"I won't end up dead," I said confidently.

Addison drove across town and it seemed like the longest ride of my life. All I could picture was some double jeopardy thing had gone down and Nick was laying either injured or killed at the house somewhere... Maybe Hugh had tried to kill him and Nick had shot back, maybe Hugh only got a quarter mile away before he could go no further in his attempts to get away... Scenarios played out in my mind.

But yet none of them seemed quite right. I was missing something, some key piece of information to make it all make sense.

Addie pulled through the gate and the car wove among the Stepford houses and down the winding hill toward Nick's house. The house lay dormant and dark, solo cups littered the lawn, and silly string hung from a tree. Several balloons had migrated out to the front lawn. Addison parked in the driveway behind Nick's Escalade and before she could say a thing, I leaped out and rushed across the lawn to the front door.

"NICK!" I screamed. The door was unlocked. I burst into the foyer, slamming the door behind me. "Nick! Please!" I thundered up the steps. "Nick!" I got to his bedroom door and I shoved it open. "Nick?" Everything was exactly as it had been left the night before when I'd gone looking for him. I felt my stomach turn; if the bed was exactly as we'd left it, then he hadn't gone to bed, he hadn't returned up here since the party.

I rushed back down the hallway, looking in every room, a deja'vu of the night before as room after room after room didn't contain Nick. My hands were shaking as I rushed back down the steps. Living room, dining room... still no Nick. I ran for the french doors that cut out to the backyard. It looked like a bomb had gone off out there, cups and streamers and napkins and the remains of popped balloons covered the lawn. I was just about to run outside to look there for Nick when I heard the front door slam and I turned around and went back through the kitchen to the foyer, expecting to see Addison having followed me into the house.

Instead, I found Cora.

She was dressed all in black; a black pencil skirt, a black tank top style blouse, a black hat perched on her severely pulled back hair, a little piece of toole that hung over her eyes. Her vibrant red lips stood out even more against her mourning widow get up. She smiled at me serenely. "Samantha," she said, and my name sounded like smoke being exhaled from her mouth, her voice seductive in a way that a hypnotist's might be. "What a pleasant surprise."

I swallowed.

"I didn't get a chance to tell you last night," she said, "But I really like your dress."

I looked down and realized I was still wearing the green dress Nick had bought for the party.

"Aren't you going to thank me for the compliment?" Cora asked regally.

I looked up at her. "Thank you," I said cooly.

Cora smiled, "That's a good girl. You learn quickly. Unfortunately not quickly enough." She stepped toward me and I stepped back and slammed into someone.

I spun, my heart racing, and found myself staring at Nick.

Chapter Forty-Five


"Nick!" I shrieked, and I wrapped my arms around him, pressed my face into his chest, smelled him, felt him. "Oh my God, I was so scared for you. Are you okay?"

"Yeah, I'm a'ight," he said, but his voice sounded strange.

I looked up at him, "Nick... what's going on?" I asked.

His eyes were full of sorrow. He opened his mouth to answer but Cora cut him off. "It's not any of your business, you nosy little beast," she said. "Nick, I told you she'd be nothing but trouble right from the start, didn't I? But you insisted on keeping her around..."

He closed his eyes.

My heart thundered. "Nick?" I pleaded. "What's going on?"

He opened this eyes again and he had tears in them that he was fighting back.

"What's going on is that you're a liability. You know too much," Cora said.

"I don't know anything," I replied, and I turned around to face her to find she had pulled a gun from God knows where and had it leveled at me. "Oh Jesus!" I cried at the sight of the barrell. I jumped back into Nick, "Oh my God."

"Cora..." Nick's voice was tired, "C'mon, stop."

"Nick, I told you it would come to this, and you didn't listen. She knows too much, we won't even get down the block before she calls the police unless we take care of her." Cora stared at him, her eyes narrowed, "Don't you want to be with me?" she demanded.

I looked up at Nick wildly.

"I --"

"Nick!" Cora shouted, "Don't you dare wimp out on me now. Not like you did with Z, not like you did last night with Hugh. She's nobody, nobody will miss her."

I felt my throat constrict. "It was you?" I asked.

Nick looked down at me.

"You... you killed Z and Hugh?"

Nick went to answer but again Cora cut him off, "No. It wasn't him. It was his idea - his idea and here I am doing all the dirty work. I was going to just divorce Hugh and jump the label, but then Hugh named me beneficiary and Nick got greedy for the millions I stood to inherit if Hugh was dead." She paused and I could see the guilt in Nick's face. "Lawrence was supposed to be implicated in Hugh's death - that's why we had to kill poor Z, he was just a stepping stone to framing a suspect. This is Lawrence's gun after all. As far as anyone would ever know Lawrence killed Hugh in revenge for Hugh killing Z... the perfect double jeopardy alibi. Instead, Nick hires a fucking gardener as a hitman..."

"He was a real hit man," Nick argued.

"Well he certainly did a piss poor job, didn't he? Taking the money and running. Didn't see him out there killing Hugh when he was supposed to, was he?"

"How was I supposed to know he was gonna run? I had Sam pay him, I never even met the guy!" I couldn't believe what I was hearing.

"See? You should've paid him yourself!" Cora yelled.

"I didn't have time to!"

"Because you were too busy fucking your alibi!" Cora hollored.

"Like you weren't fucking every guy that crossed your path!" Nick yelled back. "I know you were sleeping with the Sweed, I ain't stupid!"

"How the fuck else do you think we were gonna get such a great record deal?"

Nick rubbed his forehead, frustrated.

"Then you get all involved," Cora said, suddenly turning back to me and continuing her story, "And now nobody's going to be looking at Lawrence, they're all going to be looking at you and you know too damn much. You know about Nick and I and about Hugh naming me beneficiary. You've suspected me for Z's death the whole time... You're too smart for your own damn good, which is why we need to kill, you, too. And by we, I mean I because just like right now, Nick wussed out when we killed Z and Hugh. So no, Samantha, Nick didn't kill them. I killed them. He was supposed to, but he found he was a little trigger shy at the last moment." She shook her head, "He's too damn soft."

"I ain't soft," Nick said through clenched teeth.

"You are," Cora snapped. "You're all talk. Every time a moment comes where you can actually do what you say, you wuss-out."

"Well it's not easy," Nick muttered, his face turning red.

"Sure it is," Cora said, "You just aim and --" her finger tightened on the trigger. I felt my eyes widen as she pulled. Nick grabbed me and yanked me out of the trajectory only just in time. The bullet whizzed by and hit a cupboard down the hallway, sending glass flying every which way, one of the many gold-plated awards fell to the floor and pieces rolled across the stone tiles.

Nick was clutching me to his chest, where I'd landed when he'd yanked me out of the way. He steadied me and looked at Cora. "Stop," he said.

"What? Do you have feelings for her?" Cora snarled.

Nick clearly didn't know how to respond.

She laughed. "Oh this is unbelievable. After months of planning, and you whining and begging me for more, now you find another woman? At this point of the game, Nick?" She shook her head, "It's too late to change your mind now," she said, "You chose me, you chose the money, you chose the sex. It's too late to chose her."

"It's never too late," I said. I turned to Nick. "Nick, it's never too late. You choose your future, remember, I told you that. You choose, not her - not me - not anyone. You choose. You choose." My hands were shaking as I laid them on his chest. "You choose to be good or you choose to be bad. You're good in here Nick," I patted him over his heart.

Cora laughed. "Good people don't chose to murder their friends in the name of sex and money."

"You're right," I said, "Good people don't chose that... but you just said yourself that Nick didn't do it. You did."

Cora glowered.

I looked up at Nick. "Don't chose this, Nick," I pleaded. "I believe in you."

He licked his lips. "But it's too late. Z's dead. Hugh's dead. If I don't go, if I don't run... then what? This ain't gonna just blow over..." He stared into my eyes, "Sam, if I'd only met you sooner, then maybe you'd be right. Maybe I'd have a choice, but... I think Cora's right. I think it's too late."

I felt tears spill over onto my cheeks. "That's a lie," I whispered. "Don't be a coward, hiding behind her lies."

I heard Cora's gun click behind me. "Nick, we need to go."

"Sam," Nick whispered.

"You're just going to stand there and let her kill me because I came a little too late?" I choked. "Nick... I love you." I stared into his eyes. I refused to look away. I could feel him breaking, could feel the resolution building in him, could feel the right choice formulating and being made deep inside him...

"Oh fuck this," Cora snapped.

And what happened next happened so fast and all at once that I couldn't even comprehend it as it happened. It was only in the aftermath, as everything settled, as the glass landed on the ground and the ringing silence followed and I lay on the floor beneath him that I could wrap my mind around it... and even then it was like a blur...

Cora lifted the gun, pulled the trigger. The blast of the shot echoed through the room. The first bullet missed, and sent a rainfall of glass showering over the foyer. Nick's hands gripped my shoulders, and he spun, pulling me into him and around so that he was back-to Cora, my face pressed into his chest as he hunkered down over me, clutching me tightly, his body wrapping around mine. A second - then a third - and even a fourth gunshot rang through the room. More glass flew around us, like slow motion, and I felt Nick's body jolt with the force of two of the shots. Then the weight of him came down against me and I fell backward. Nick's eyes meeting mine, a sort of dumbfounded expression on his face. We stared into eachother's eyes as we fell onto the floor among the glass shards and broken awards.

His mouth moved, but no sound came out, but I could clearly see the word he was forming -- Sam.

Empty clicks echoed through the foyer as my back hit the floor and Nick's weight landed on top of me. Cora's gun was out of ammo. "God fucking damn it!" she screamed.

The front door burst open.

Three cops poured into the foyer, guns up.

Cora dropped the gun in her hand. It hit the floor with a thump, and her hands went into the air.

Nick shuddered on top of me and I quickly rolled him over, my breath catching in my throat as I saw the blood on my hands. "Oh no, oh no, no," I wailed and I grappled at his shirt, ripping the buttons of his suit clean off him, pulling it open, revealing his chest. His perfec chest. Still perfect, unbroken by the bullets that had gone into his back. "Nick," I begged. He was heaving for breath. "Oh Jesus, somebody help him," I pleaded.

The cops rushed over and knelt down beside us. One of the officers turned Nick onto his side. He grabbed the radio clipped to his shoulder, "We have a GSW in here!" he yelled into it.

"Sss- sss- S-Sam," Nick choked, his voice shaking, his eyes unfocused, struggling still to keep me in his vision. "Sam..."

"I'm here," I answered, and I bent forward to stare into his face, put my hands on his cheeks. "Nick, I'm right here. They're gonna help you."

"I-it-it's t-too late," he choked.

"It's never too late," I whispered.

He stared into my face. He was convulsing, just a little, his eyes searching mine.

A couple EMTs rushed into the room pushing a stretcher, carrying equipment. They plunged themselves to the floor around him, one of them grabbed hold of me and pushed me back. "S-Sam..." Nick protested, and he reached a shaking hand through the throng of EMTs and I grabbed hold of it as they continued ripping away his jacket and shirt to get to his back. My fingers twined with his until he lost his grip and his fingers slipped away.

Chapter Forty-Six


"The LAPD has begun a state-wide manhunt for pop sensation Cora Walters, who is currently named as the prime suspect in the murders of producer Justin 'Z' Platt, label executive and her husband, Hugh Walters, and in the shooting of Backstreet Boy Nick Carter. If anyone has any information on the whereabouts of Cora Walters, the LAPD is asking that you please step forward. Miss. Walters is considered armed and dangerous. Nick Carter is currently in the intensive care unit at an undisclosed Los Angeles area hospital, according to his publicist, and his condition is critical. We will keep you updated on the search for Cora and on Nick's condition throughout the evening."

The TV in the waiting rom was blaring and I was shaking.

I couldn't breathe.

Addison was sitting next to me, her arms around me, holding me close to her. Every ounce of my body felt cold, like ice had been poured down it. I couldn't feel my heart, I was convinced it'd stopped beating.

"It's gonna be okay," Addie whispered in my ear.

I couldn't even answer her. My mouth wasn't working properly. All I could think over and over and over again was that he had that split second, that one moment, that instant in time in which he could make a choice... and he'd made the least selfish one he possibly could've made. He'd chosen good.

I rocked myself.

"Sam..." Addison rubbed my knee. "I wish I could fix it."

"You can't, you don't understand," I choked, "I love him."

Addison was quiet a long moment, "I understand more than you think, Sam."

I shook my head, "You can't..."

"But I do."

"No you don't," I snapped, tears blurring my vision, "The man that you love isn't dead. He didn't die for you!"

"He's not dead yet, Sam, stop talking like that..." Addison choked back, "And I do understand. Maybe not for me, but the man I fell for is dead, Sam!"

I looked over at her, "What?"

Tears filled her eyes, "Sam, Hugh Walters and I... we were... seeing each other. As far as I know, Cora didn't know about it." Her cheeks turned pink and she looked down at her lap.

I stared at her, incredulously dumbfounded, despite everything else going on. "How long?" I whispered.

"Since the day after I auditioned," she whispered back.

"But -- you said you wouldn't sleep with him."

"Not for the contract, not for money," Addison replied. "It wasn't like that. He made that clear..." Addison took a deep breath. "Sam, Hugh and I... we fell in love." She bit her lip. "He was going to divorce Cora." She stared into my eyes.

I closed my eyes. I covered my face.

"They killed him for nothing," I whispered. "He was leaving her anyway."

"They killed him for the money," Addison said.

"It's always about the god damn money," I said, my voice shaking.

Addison stared at her feet. "Sam..." she looked up at me. "Cora's not going to get away."

"She already did. She's probably half way to Taiwan or something by now," I said. Anger swelled in my gut at the thought of her leaving, of shooting Nick in the back and leaving him there to die in my arms on the floor of his foyer.

"She can't be," Addison's voice trembled. "She's broke."

"What?"

"There's no money in her bank account," Addison said.

I stared at her, "What? Why? How?"

Addison took a deep breath, "Because Hugh was worried she might drain it on him if she thought he was going to file a divorce and he put all of his money into an account in my name," she said. "So that she couldn't touch it."

I felt my eyes go wide, felt my heart pump a rhythm so fast that it echoed in my ears. "You have Hugh's money?" I hissed.

"Every red cent," Addison whispered.

I stared at her.

"Cora under estimated Hugh, Sam," Addison said quietly.

"Oh my God."

The doors to the room opened and Addison and I both shot up to our feet like we were jack-in-the-boxes as Angel, Nick's sister, came bursting into the room. She was breathless. "Samantha?" she gasped.

"Is he okay?" I begged, stepping forward.

Angel studied me for a long moment. "He's asking for you."

"He's alive?!" I cried.

Angel nodded, "He's in a lot of pain, but he's awake, and he's alive."

"Oh my God." I turned ot Addison. "He's alive," I wailed.

"I heard that!" Addison said, "Go! Go see him. I'll wait here." She sat back down in the chair and I bustled to follow Angel into the hallway.

I paused. "Wait a second," I said, and I backed up and looked at Addie as she sat, staring up at the tiny TV mouted to the corner of the room. "Addison," I said, catching her attention, "I'm sorry. About Hugh. About everything."

"I am, too," Addison said quietly.

I ducked after Angel in the hallway. She led the way through crisp, ammonia-scented halls until we entered the ICU and I saw Nick hung up on a gurney in one corner, his eyes closed, an oxygen mask across his nose. My hands shook as I stepped forward, and Angel hovered by the foot of the bed.

"Nick," I whispered, "I'm here."

His eyelids fluttered ever so slightly and finally lifted, his eyes struggling to focus on me. "Sam," he croaked quietly.

"I'm right here, sweetie," I said, running my fingers through his hair softly as I leaned over him.

He stared up at me, eyes barely opened, barely focused. "Didn't you hear Cora, Sam? Didn't you hear her? About all the things that've happened? About the stuff I've done?" He stared at me in concern.

I nodded. "I did... But Nick, didn't you hear me when I told you the past doesn't matter? You can only change the future."

"Do you still... love me... Sam?" he asked.

I stared into his eyes.

"Or in fifty years...are you..gonna be.. the one that... got away?"

I shook my head. "I'm not going anywhere."

Chapter Forty-Seven


Despite Addison's promise that Cora couldn't get far, it had been over a month since the day in Nick's foyer, and Nick was finally getting to go home. It'd been a long month, a month of touch-and-go and reparitive surgeries up until the last week, when Nick had become so restless and antsy that he was driving everyone - especially the doctors and nurses - insane, and they finally sent him home.

The nurses help me load him into a wheel chair, and I pushed him carefully down the hallway as he clutched a duffle bag full of stuff that he'd slowly collected in his hospital room over the course of the month. "Bump," I warned him, as I wheeled him into the elevator.

On the ride down, my mind wandered over all the things that had happened in the past month. Addison had officially been named Hugh Walters' beneficiary and inherited not only the millions he'd already transferred to her account before his death but also one-third executive rights of the Walters Records company. Because she was so busy with everything else, Addison had immediately hired Lawrence to run the record company in her absence. Then she went on tour as planned, and even without Cora most of the shows remained sold-out and fully packed for her, despite the headline act being completely changed. Playing with Fire, the album, dropped on the third week and was still at the number one spot on the charts.

Cora had been completely cut out of Hugh Walters' will, and what little bit Hugh hadn't cleaned out himself from her bank accounts, the LAPD froze in hopes of stranding her somewhere that they could find her.

There had been several moments during the month, too, when Nick had almost told the authorities the whole story, including his part in it, but he was too afraid of what would happen. We spent an entire night talking about it about halfway through the month, though, and we'd agreed that we should keep Nick's involvement a secret - sheerly beause he hadn't really done anything. He hadn't been present at either murder, and the hitman he had paid had ended up not doing his job. Really, Nick was nothing more than privvy to information, he wasn't even truly an accessory.

At least that's how we rationalized the choice to keep Nick's past a secret.

Who knew how long keeping the secret would last.

We were crossing the main lobby of the hospital when the TVs suddenly displayed a photo of Cora, with the word BREAKING diagonally across the screen and Nick pulled the brake on the wheel chair I was pushing him out to the car in. I looked up at the screen.

"This jus in, authorities of the LAPD are currently surrounding the home in the West Hollywood neighborhood where Backstreet Boy Nick Carter lives in connection to the manhunt for Cora Walters." The screen flashed to an image of Nick's house.

I gasped. "Oh my God."

Nick's eyes were wide.

"An anonymous tip has led the authorities to believe that Walters was waiting at the residence after hearing that Carter was being released this afternoon from the local hospital after last month's shooting. This is the third anonymous tip authorities have received on the manhunt, including Cora sightings in Washington State, near the Canadian border, and downtown Los Angeles."

I instinctively put a protective hand on Nick's shoulder, and he put his hand over mine.

We watched the live footage as the LAPD stormed the house, kicking in Nick's door and rushing in. Nick's hand tightened on mine. We waited.

It seemed like ages. It seemed even longer than the past month.

And then a couple of police officers came out of the front door of the house, Cora between them, her hands behind her back, trying to shake them off. She was shouting, you could tell even from the distace the video feed was at from her. The officers opened the door of their car and, putting a hand on her head, set her into it before closing her in.

Nick let out a breath he'd been holding.

I felt like clapping.

I pushed Nick into the parking lot as the TV switched to another news story. A sleek black car from Walters Records, sent by Lawrence, was waiting out front, the door held open by Stanley. "We meet again," he greeted me as I pushed Nick over.

Nick glanced up at me, then back at Stanley. "You all know each other?"

"Stanley drove me to the restaurant that night, when you asked me to be your private investigator slash assistant," I explained.

Nick laughed, "Some private investigator you turned out to be."

"I never claimed to be one," I confessed.

Stanley laughed and held out his hands to help Nick up and Nick took them and slid into the car carefully. "Thanks Stan-the-Man," I said, grinning.

"Anytime, Miss." He grabbed Nick's empty wheelchair and brought it back into the hospital lobby before returning to drive us back to my place, since Nick's was currently the dissolving scene of a manhunt search.

Nick turned to me, "I have a confession to make."

"Yes?"

"I didn't hire you for your monking skills," he said.

"No?"

"Obviously, I didn't want you to find out about me, you know?"

"What would you have done if I had?" I asked.

Nick smirked, "Sam, I dunno if you noticed but you're the worst damn private investigator money could buy. I'm sorry, but it's true..." He laughed as I pretended to glare at him. "Honestly, I hired you for an alibi, originally, and because you were intriguing that night and although I didn't want to admit it, even to myself, I was interested even then in spending more time with you... and you working for me was the perfect excuse. I told myself that being around a woman 24/7 would make Cora jealous, but really it was because you made me feel better about myself in a menial conversation than Cora had managed to make me feel that entire night."

"Well, I hope to continue working for you for a long time," I said.

Nick shook his head, "No," he said, "You can't."

"I can't?"

"Yeah. Cos that'd be prostitution, and I'm pretty sure that's illegal." He kissed my cheek.

"Like you care about illegal," I said throatily, grinning as Nick's mouth ran along my neckline.

Nick laughed against my skin. "I'm in the business of making good choices now, haven't you heard?"

"Oh are you?"

Nick smirked. "Yes," he replied. "For instance, I have a choice of sitting up nice and straight and keeping my seatbelt on right now, which would be good... or the choice of making love to you right here in the backseat of this car, which would be bad... And guess which one I'm going to chose?"

"Sometimes," I said, "It's good to be bad."

Nick grinned and unclipped his seatbelt. "I was hoping you'd say that..."