(Buffalo, NY Sunday July 2)
"These fireworks ought to be GREAT tonight. Nothing like getting across into Canada and enjoying some Independence Day celebration early!" Joey said to Lance as they came back across the Rainbow Bridge. It should have felt good to get out, the day was sunny and warm. Niagara Falls had looked spectacular from the Canadian side. No one had hassled them at the border, because the men and women who worked there were too old to be in touch with what their grandchildren liked to listen to.
Lance had done as well as could be expected to stay focused on the tour, and keep himself busy.
There were always commitments to keep him busy, *N SYNC P R that might have him calling a radio station in another town where they’ll be in a week from now. All sorts of tour crap, the nightly rituals of sound check, and Meet and Greet. Then the hour and a half on stage where he could put it into ‘automatic’ and pretend everything was okay. There were FreeLance auditions to coordinate with Planet Hollywood and other investments he was having people look into for him. The only difficult part was trying to get through those daily phone calls with his family and thinking of reasons why Mercedes wasn’t there to say ‘hello’. And then there was the period of time between midnight and dawn when he was alone and thought about her. And the facade came down and he ached.
Lance tried to convince himself that Chris was probably right and it was only a matter of time before Mercedes came back. She just needed some time and space to clear her mind, and deal with all the crap she found out about Liam, his infidelities and his role in the miscarriage she had. Lance couldn’t quite understand why she wouldn’t let him hold her and comfort her, but he’d be here when she was ready to let him help...Mercedes was going to come back and he was going to be here waiting for her.
"What do you think the hotel management will think about your fireworks idea?" Lance asked.
"I’m not worried about them as much as I am the local police." Joey laughed.
The friends brought their packages up to their rooms and that’s when they noticed Johnny had arrived and was holding court with Tim Miller, Justin, Chris and J.C. in Chris and Dani’s room.
"Wonder what’s up?" Joey asked. "Let’s say ‘hey’!"
Lance stood leaning against the door frame and Joey ran into the room and practically jumped on Johnny. "Hi!"
"Glad you made it back. I have to talk to you two about this FAX I received yesterday." Johnny said. He gave a special ‘hi’ to Lance.
"How’s it going, Lance?"
"Fine. Something must be up to bring you here."
"We received a blackmail threat. This doesn‘t come as a surprise, guys. It’s pretty much as we expected. I thought you guys might want to discuss how we should handle it."
Lance looked away. "Did he send..."
"The photograph? Yes, he did."
Chris, Justin and J.C. watched Lance closely. "Okay, did y’all look at it?" Lance asked.
"No, Lance they didn’t. We figured we‘d leave it up to your discretion." Johnny told him.
Lance looked between his friends and Johnny, shrugged his shoulders and said, "Alright, lemme see it."
Johnny looked at him compassionately, "Alright." He handed Lance a manila envelope. Lance took it out into the empty hall with him.
His hands trembled as he opened the envelope and slipped the photograph out. "Damn." he said out loud. It really looked genuine. "How in God’s name...?"
When he reentered the hotel room, he asked Johnny if he had any theories as to how a photo like that could’ve been taken without him having any memory of the event.
"Mercedes had a theory..." Johnny began to answer Lance’s question, but the mere mention of HER NAME caused Lance to flinch. It was a band aid being torn off a wound. Now it was exposed again, still bleeding and painful. The rest of the crew had avoided even the mere suggestion of her and after days of trying not to think about her...this was like Johnny had stabbed Lance with a knife in his heart.
"Take a look at the magazine on the night stand, PARIS MATCH. Simple. That cover was from September, remember Lance Justin had said that you were OUT COLD for a day and a half from that medicine you were taking for a migraine."
"Can we look?" Joey asked. Lance was embarrassed by the photograph and wasn’t too keen on having his friends see it, even if he was pretty certain that they knew it had been staged. "Come on, Scoop. I promise I won’t start asking to get separate dressing rooms on the tour or get all funny about sitting around in my boxers in front of you. Come on! We know you!"
"I don’t think so." It was bad enough when he conjured up the imagine of Mercedes having seen it.
Johnny spoke, "Lance, I know that this is an uncomfortable situation. But, I’m going to ask you to consider letting the guys see the photo. Let me explain why."
Lance gave Johnny a ‘you’ve got to be kidding’ look.
"It’s just possible that one of the guys could recognize the purple haired dude in the photo as someone that hung around with Liam. Or was just hanging around and Liam hired him for the shoot."
Lance thought about that. He placed the manila envelope up to his lips, then nervously tapped it against his face. After a few more minutes had passed by, Lance reneged. "Alright but I swear to God if one of you guys EVER brings this up again....I’ll bust open another set of knuckles from using them on your face."
"Alright Sadie," Gwen said as she watched Mercedes return from yet another morning run into the toilet. "What in the world is wrong with you?"
Mercedes sat in front of the brewing pot of tea and looked at Gwen with puppy dog eyes. "Please don’t make me talk about this yet."
"Sadie, I gave you the first day and a half because you were worn out from the flight. Then I gave you another day and a half because I thought you had the flu, and frankly I didn’t want to catch it myself. But, NOW I am fairly certain that it ISN’T the flu...you’re preggers or I’m a monkey’s uncle."
"Curious George?" Mercedes smiled meekly.
"Don’t you go cranking my handle, sweetie. I’m your friend remember? I am not here to judge your actions."
All Mercedes could do was blubber. Cover her face and cry. Gwen put a reassuring arm around her and patted her shoulder. "Does the Daddy know?"
Mercedes nodded, ‘yes.’
"He didn’t want you to have an abortion did he?" Gwen asked with a touch of anger and a firm conviction.
Mercedes shook her head, "No, that’s not it. He was thrilled about the baby."
"Oh, he wants to marry you and you’re thinking he’s just doing it because of the baby."
"No." Mercedes grabbed her napkin and wiped her eyes. "We already were getting married the morning we found out we were expecting."
"Oh." Gwen gave her girlfriend a funny look, "So, did you marry him?"
"Yes." Mercedes started to cry all over again.
"Sadie, did he hurt you? Did he turn out to be a wife beater or something?"
"No." Mercedes took a deep breath. "He’s WONDERFUL. He is the most amazing person I have ever met."
"Let me try and get this straight." Gwen went to the cupboard to get a box of saltine crackers. She figured this was going to be a long story.
"I don’t recognize this guy, but I certainly DO recognize his tattoo." Justin said.
"Seriously, does it confirm in your mind the time table we were thinking?" asked Johnny.
"It was definitely the time Lance was ill. This guy, I don’t remember him having purple hair, but this guy was hanging around...and I remember him showing me his tattoo. I thought it was really cool, and unique. Somewhere on the Left Bank he had it done. I remember because I thought about copying it." Justin said with a sheepish grin.
"Maybe Liam had him dye his hair so he would be hard to recognize." J.C. offered.
Lance kept out of the conversation pretty much detaching himself. Chris watched him sit over next to the window. Lance didn’t seem to care about the blackmail threat. If Chris were a betting man, he’d bet there was only one person that Lance was concerned about in connection with this photograph. It was possible that Lance was worried that Mercedes believed the photograph was real.
"Today we’re going to get you an appointment with my physician. But first you are calling your husband."
"Didn’t you hear what I told you about Victoria? She isn’t going to be satisfied until she inherits EVERYTHING. I have to convince her that Lance doesn’t stand to inherit anything, otherwise she is going to have him KILLED."
"Sadie, be rational. You and your sister have more than enough cash, stocks, bonds and investments to live very well for a very long time. Why should Victoria CARE about getting your half? There’s no way your sister is going to try anything like that and risk living in Attica instead of Park Avenue."
"Gwen, it isn’t a matter of the money, this is personal. She will have me committed if I return to the States. At the very least she wants Power of Attorney and no other lose ends. I cannot let her find me, and she can never know that I didn’t go through with the abortion she planned for me."
"Alright, alright...let’s assume, for the moment, that your theory is correct."
"It’s NOT a theory, Dr. Westfall is afraid of her, too. He could’ve lost his license to practice medicine if she ever found out that he didn’t abort my baby. He doesn’t perform abortions any more, but he had botched an illegal abortion many years ago. Victoria knows that, and she is holding that over his head."
"Ok, OK. But, WHY? It doesn’t make sense."
Mercedes dropped her eyes to the floor. "I’ve been trying to understand that myself."
Gwen pushed on, "Okay, regardless, how are you going to convince her of anything when you have to remain in hiding until this baby is born? Most importantly, you’ve left Lance over there with no clue as to the threat looming over you, the baby and for crying out loud, Sadie he has NO IDEA that your sister may be plotting against him, too!"
"I figured out a way to spare him." Mercedes got those sick little puppy dog eyes again.
"Why is it, I don’t think I’m going to like this?"
"I saw a lawyer the afternoon I was in Orlando. He’s an old friend of ours."
"NOT Richard." Gwen said. Mercedes just nodded, ‘yes.’ "SADIE McKENZIE. Aren’t you ever going to give up on me and Richard getting back together?"
"Never Gwen, but, honestly in this case I just didn’t know who else I could trust." Tears started to fall again and her friend couldn’t possibly be angry.
"Please tell me you wrote up a prenup. Don’t tell me you’ve gone and filed for..."
Mercedes nodded her head, ‘yes’ again and then the flood gates opened. "Oh, Sadie." Gwen put her arms around her. "What are we going to do?"
(Raleigh, NC Wednesday, July 5)
(Hilton Hotel Lobby)
"Sorry, do you have a reservation at this hotel?" A rather imposing man at the door asked.
"I have business here." The man said, handing him his card.
"Well, listen, we had to try and keep some semblance of order in the lobby. It’s kind of crazy here today."
"Some VIP visiting?"
"Yeah, nothing you’d probably get too excited about though." Mike smiled. "Sorry to have detained you, go right ahead in." Then, Mike stepped aside.
Soon, the guys came down from their floor on their way to the sound check at the Entertainment and Sports Arena. There was a lot of laughter, and even though he wasn’t laughing, Lance had a smile on his face. Joey had just retold a story from an encounter the night before.
"Well, at least I’ve been tested for drugs, Joey...what’s your excuse?" J.C. laughed.
"Man, if only it were that easy to rid yourself of a blackmail threat. Now, I have to submit to that paternity blood test all over again. I’d much rather piss in a cup. Did Chris tell you about his decision to tell the whole world about him and Dani ?" J.C. nodded at Joey while Justin and Lance lagged behind.
"Lance Bass?" The man asked as the guys walked by.
"Hi!" Lance said in passing.
"I’ve got something for you." The man reached into his suit coat pocket.
Wes made it his business to stand in between the man in the suit coat and Lance. Lance kind of gave the stranger a smirk, "Don’t mind him he just likes to throw his weight around." But, Lance kept on walking.
"It’s my duty to serve you with these papers." Wes went to take the papers from the man, but he alked. "No sir, by law I am suppose to hand them directly to Mr. Bass."
"What’s this jury duty?" Wes said laughing. Lance stopped, turned and took the papers out of the man’s hands.
"Everybody has a job to do. You’ve done yours, ‘bye!’ " Lance waved him away.
"I need you to sign for this." The man said thrusting a clip board under his chin.
"Yeah, yeah. Thanks." Lance said, signing absentmindedly.
Riding in the tour bus to the venue, Wes asked Lance about the papers. "Haven’t even looked at them." Lance admitted.
"You could’ve won a MILLION dollars like in some Reader’s Digest contest..." Justin laughed and rubbed his hands together. "OOooo, let’s see." As Lance brings the envelope out of his jean vest pocket, Justin grabs it from Lance and opens it up.
"This is to inform you..."
Chris started laughing immediately, "Sounds promising, Scoop. It‘s either the money, or Uncle Sam drafting you."
Suddenly, Justin stopped reading out loud. His eyes scan the papers, he looked over at Chris who was laughing his butt off. Justin shook his head at him and his eyes begged him to stop.
"What’s the matter?" Chris said, still grinning, "Come upon a word you can’t pronounce?"
Justin looked at Lance. "I’m sorry, Lance. I don’t think you want me reading this." Reluctantly, J hands the papers over to a very bewildered friend.
