Part 9:
So You Know Nick and Brian?
Howie pushed the end
button on the cell phone, Leighanne’s cries still echoing in his ears. She had sounded so upset and hysterical,
Howie did not know what to do. He had
begged her to call her mother or a friend and talk it out, anything to keep her
occupied until he could find out more information, but she had been
inconsolable.
“So you know Nick and
Brian?” Mo asked.
Looking over at Mo, Howie
could tell the man had said something, but he had not been listening. “I’m sorry, did you say something?” he asked,
the cell phone still clutched tightly in his hand.
“I said, so you know Nick
and Brian?”
“I know a Nick and Brian.”
“Yeah, me too. I know a Nick and Brian, but I doubt if they
are the same guys that you know.” Mo
sort of laughed to himself, while Howie just ignored him.
Leaning forward, Howie
asked the driver how much further until they reached the address. Craning his neck to look out the window, the
driver seemed to be lost.
“I’m sure that the Nick and
Brian I know aren’t the same guys you know.” Mo continued the conversation he and Howie had
been having, despite Howie’s obvious lack of interest. “The Nick and Brian I know aren’t from around
here. They’re from Florida.”
Howie’s head snapped up at
the mention of Florida, as Mo continued on. “Two stupid little fucks, my Nick
and Brian. One’s a big guy, and the
other one is sort of little, and both of them are as dumb as rocks.” Mo laughed again, flipping out his wrist to
check the time.
Howie’s jaw dropped open
ever so slightly, and his mouth went dry as the interior lights of the car
gleamed off of the shining sliver and stunning blue cobalt blue of the Rolex
watch on Mo’s arm.
It had been a few years
back, while on tour in Europe, that Howie and Brian had gone shopping, and
Brian had picked out the special design Rolex, custom made by a jeweler in
London. Brian had called the brilliant
timepiece the “indulgence of a lifetime,” and as far as Howie knew, he had not
taken it off his wrist since the day he’d purchased it.
Looking at it now on Mo’s
wrist gave Howie a sick feeling in the pit of his stomach. His eyes quickly shifted to the Kentucky hat
on Mo’s head, again to the Rolex, and finally to the gold wedding band perched
on his pinky. Brian’s gold wedding band.
Before Howie could say
another word, Mo’s fist shot out, plowing into Howie’s face, his head rocketing
back into the window, making him see stars, as his cell phone fell from his
grip to the floor below.
At the sound of Howie’s
head hitting the window, the driver turned.
He started to say something, but it was too late. Mo had already scrambled up between the seats,
hands around the driver’s neck. One
quick snap, and it was all over, as the driver slumped down, dead in his seat,
and the car veered off of the road.
***
Mo grabbed the wheel and
spun it hard right, coming to an abrupt stop as it rolled down a hill and
crashed into a tree. Kicking the car
door open, Mo pushed the driver’s body to the ground before he crawled out
behind him. He moved quickly, grabbing
the driver under both armpits as he dragged him around to the back seat and
opened the door.
The kid in the back was
passed out cold, lying on the floor. He
must have rolled off of the seat when they made impact with the tree, which
worked out just fine for Mo. Hefting the
dead body up onto the seat, he laid it down and slammed the door shut. Then, climbing back into the car, he turned
the key in the ignition.
“C’mon,” he growled, as
the car sputtered and died. Trying it
again, Mo pushed the gas pedal to the floor, the car roaring and dying once
more.
Climbing out, Mo pulled
open the now dented hood from the collision with the tree and checked the
engine. Fiddling with a few things, he
climbed back in the car, twisted the key, and gave it the gas, the car coming
to life as he popped it into drive and slowly started his way back up the hill.
Giving it one last surge of gas, he
burst up onto the road, the car weaving over the median, almost colliding with
an oncoming white van that swerved to miss them. Then, wiping the sweat from his brow, he
readjusted the rearview mirror and headed for his apartment.
***
Dan Fortis, a reporter
with the local news crew, was on his way to another boring live remote about recycling
when he and his cameraman were almost sideswiped by a burgundy town car that
came out of nowhere, almost plowing headfirst into them.
“Stupid son of a bitch!” Dan
yelled, as the cameraman cranked the wheel to the right to avoid being hit. “Probably some drunk on his way home from a
night of partying.”
Checking his watch, Dan
was early to the remote, as always. He
had begun getting tired of the same old live remote. They always sent him to craft fairs or
restaurants or places where boring commentary was given over his lame attempts
at jokes. He wanted something to sink
his teeth into, a hard-hitting story that would get him some notice, but so far
all he was was the morning news clown.
“Hey, check that out.” As they continued down the road, his cameraman
Roger pointed to the glow of red and blue lights coming from the wooded area up
ahead to their right. “Must be something
big going on?” From the looks of it,
there had to be at least two dozen police cars, and that was just what they could
see from the road.
“Pull over,” Dan ordered,
his hand on the door.
“But we have to get to
recycling remote.”
“We’re early anyway, and
besides, it could be something big. It
could be the chance I’ve been waiting for.”
***
Forces of nature seemed
determined to keep Nick and Brian from making it to shore. The wind howled, and the waves were angry, as
Brian continued holding tightly to Nick, his arms now locked beneath Nick’s
armpits as he struggled to keep the blonde head from disappearing beneath the
water’s surface.
“Jesus, you’re heavy,” Brian
muttered, as he pulled Nick up once more.
“You eat too many freaking Twinkies.” He waited for Nick to laugh, but Nick’s body
was dead weight in his arms. “You know I
can’t do this without your help. I
sacrificed everything for you, but if you won’t help yourself, then fuck you.”
When he got no response,
Brian simply let go of Nick, wondering if the old saying “sink or swim” was
really true. Thunder crashed loudly
overhead, as Nick sunk below the water and did not reappear.
“Shit.” Diving under the water, Brian could see Nick’s
lifeless body twisting downwards, his eyes closed, arms outstretched. And he realized, as he dragged Nick up again,
that he was thinking about that stupid Monopoly game. He finally remembered what had happened after
Nick had thrown the pieces and the board all over the hotel room.
The two had been doubled
over on the bed laughing tears rolling down their faces when Nick yelled out,
“You won, okay? I give up!” Instead of finishing the game and losing to
Brian, Nick had just given up. Brian had
known Nick long enough to know that whenever he was faced with difficult things,
he always took the easy way out. And now,
here Nick was, facing the most difficult challenge of his lifetime, and just
like that night with the Monopoly game, Nick was giving up.
***
Dan slid out of the
unmarked white van, which they had parked off to the side of the road in the
shadows. Zipping up his dark blue jacket
and placing Roger’s black baseball cap on his head, he walked quickly down the
side of road and into the woods.
There was a lot of
activity going on. He could see groups
of officers roping off a perimeter with crime scene tape. He could also see more officers standing by
police cars that were staggered all over the dirt road that cut through the
center of the woods. Pulling his cap
down lower, he jammed his hands into his pockets and tried to look as if he
belonged.
***
Officer Park finally found
Sergeant Cox working the outer perimeter of the crime scene in the woods where
the two bodies had been found. He was
speaking to one of the other officers and pointing to where he wanted the crime
scene tape as Park walked up.
“Sergeant, can I speak
with you for a minute?” His Sergeant
shot him a dirty look as he waved the other officer away and stepped off to the
side, Park following.
“I understand you have a
problem with following rules, Park. You
know you could have gotten yourself killed, coming down here without your partner
or backup.” Cox reached for his radio,
turning it down just enough so that he could still hear the mumbling hum from
dispatch.
“If I would have followed
my instincts in the first place and pulled over when I saw that truck, that kid
in the woods would still be alive.”
“Maybe, maybe not. You don’t know that for sure. Besides, if you would have saved that
one-” The Sergeant hitched his thumb in
the direction of the ambulance that was pulling out onto he road with Brian’s
body inside. “-then the other one at the warehouse would have died. You had to make a choice.”
“And what if he dies, too,
sir?”
“Then you did your best,
Park, and that’s all you can do.”
The two men stood silent
for a moment, and then Park spoke again. “Sir, we have no information on the identities
of the victims or the man who appeared to be the shooter. Martin said that you spoke to dispatch before
you sent us out on the call.”
Cox nodded. “That’s right. Dispatch radioed us that there had been a call
from a man on a cell phone. He told them
he had information that a friend of his was in trouble and in need of
assistance. After we sent you on the
call, we got another call back from dispatch.
They said that the call could be some sort of prank call, but that the
caller said his friend was the member of some singing group called The
Backstreet something or other.”
***
Dan Fortis stood ten feet
from where Park and Sergeant Cox were speaking, his ears perking up at the
mention of the popular boy band. Moving
in a little closer, he picked up a piece of the yellow crime scene tape that
had dropped to the ground and pretended to secure it to a tree trunk.
***
Sergeant Cox reached down
for his radio calling into dispatch, and within seconds, he had two names. Howie Dorough and Nick Carter. Dispatch had done some research, and these
names were indeed the names of two of the members of the singing group The
Backstreet Boys. Whether or not these
were the two young men whose bodies had been found at the scene at this point
was anybody’s guess.
“Park, get on the radio to
headquarters and see if you can round up any family members or friends who may
know something about this Carter and Dorough. Where they’re staying, if they’re married, if
they have families, whatever you can find out. If those two victims are high profile, we need
to get on this before the press picks up the story.”
***
Dan heard the names as
plain as day and was well aware of who Howie and Nick were from his time spent
doing cheesy entertainment reports a few years back at a news station in Tulsa. Turning to walk away, he was planning on
casually making his way back to the van, when he bumped into an officer
carrying a roll of crime scene tape.
“Sorry,” Dan muttered,
keeping his eyes down to avoid eye contact.
“No problem,” the guy said,
as Dan kept moving. “Hey wait a minute.”
Shit. Stopping, Dan turned, the brim of his hat
still low over his eyes.
“Do you guys need any more
tape over there?”
Dan shook his head, giving
the guy the thumbs up. “Nope, we’ve got
plenty.”
“Okay.” The guy turned and walked down the hill. Smiling, Dan made his way back through the
woods to the van, his heart pounding in his chest as he walked around to the
driver’s side and pounded on the window.
***
Roger was slumped down in
the seat, eyes closed, half-asleep, when Dan banged on the window, scaring the
shit out of him.
“Wake up, you fat fuck!” Dan
yelled, as Roger opened the door. “We
got a story, man, and it’s a good one.” Grabbing Roger’s arm, Dan pulled him from the
truck, climbing over the driver’s seat to grab his microphone and earpiece.
“Get the camera, and meet
me around the back of the van. We’ll use
the woods for the backdrop, and I want to make sure we can get all the flashing
lights in there for dramatic effect.”
Roger followed Dan around
to the back of the van. “We’re supposed
to be doing a live remote about recycling,” Roger said, opening the back of the
van doors to get out his camera equipment.
“Yeah, well, plans have
changed.” Dan tossed the black baseball
cap to the ground and shoved the earpiece in his ear. Once Roger had everything set up, he gave him
the signal that everything was a go, and Dan then heard the familiar static as
he connected into the news studio, followed by the sound of Anna, one of the
morning news anchors, in his ear.
“And now we will be
joining Dan Fortis on a live remote from The Adams Recycling plant, where he
will be giving us tips on recycling. Dan...” Roger pointed to him, as the red light on the
camera flashed on, and Dan was live.
“Thanks, Anna. This is Dan Fortis, and I am live from the
scene of a gruesome double homicide that has taken place in this wooded area
off of I-95.” Dan could hear the
shuffling of papers and the voice of his news director calling him every name
in the book as he continued on, “The victims appear to be Nick Carter and Howie
Dorough, two members of the popular boy band The Backstreet Boys.”
***
Colette was lying on the
bed in the hotel room, drifting in and out of sleep, as the TV played on in the
background. The words seeped into her subconscious
like some sort of horrible nightmare.
“The victims appear to
be Nick Carter and Howie Dorough…”
Sitting up, she rubbed her
eyes and walked to the TV, staring into the eyes of the young reporter on the
screen.
“At this point, we
don’t have a lot of details to report. What
we do know is that the two were shot somewhere in these woods behind me…”
***
Word of the shooting
spread like wildfire, and within the half-hour, it was being reported on every
station from CNN to MTV. Pictures of
Nick and Howie, along with old footage from their music videos, as well as the Millennium
and Black and Blue tours, played behind the reporters as they went over
and over the vague details they had about the shooting.
***
Kevin was on vacation – well,
that was if you could call it a vacation.
He had made plans to rent an old fishing cabin in Bear Lake, Utah for
the whole month, figuring it would be a nice place for Kris and him to relax and
spend some time together. Kris had been
sweet about his idea, telling him she loved him dearly, but smelly fish and
boring scenery were not her idea of a vacation.
Instead, she opted for a more upscale retreat at a posh spa in Arizona. So they had lovingly gone their separate ways
to relax with an agreement to meet in Maui at the end of the month for some
romantic one on one time.
Kevin was sitting in the living
room of the cabin, fiddling with some fishing lures and bait, when he saw the
news about the shooting on the small black and white TV that sat on the coffee
table. At first, it had been a muffled
hum in the background, until he heard the names Nick Carter and Howie Dorough. Looking up, he expected to see them at the
opening of some club or hanging out at a charity event. Instead, he saw images of the band flash
across the screen, as a teletype ran across the bottom of the screen in white
capital letters…
NICK CARTER AND HOWIE
DOROUGH OF THE BAND THE BACKSTREET BOYS HAVE BEEN SHOT AND KILLED IN LOS
ANGELES CALIFORNIA. DETAILS AT NOON.
Kevin reached forward in
slow motion, his head spinning as he turned up the volume knob on the TV. He listened quietly while the gray-haired
news anchor reiterated what Kevin now already knew. Dropping the lures and bait to the ground, he
fell to his knees and began to sob.
***