Heather’s Weakness



Brian and AJ arrived at Nick’s home the very next day, around noon. Of course, Heather was there. She had told Nick earlier that day that she wasn’t going to keep him out of her site. She had even brought over her own little dog. A posh little poodle, straight from France. And whenever Nick made a move, that little dog yelped and yelped.

Nick explained the situation to both AJ and Brian. Brian knew all about Ava and Nick getting her pregnant. But AJ had only known about the rumors floating around in the press.

“I always knew we’d get stories like that written about us in cheesy magazines. But I thought it’d be me they’d be writing about first. Never you.” AJ said out loud, walking around the bedroom. Heather heard them talking and stood in Nick’s bedroom doorway.

“Hello, Brian. It’s been quite a while since I saw you last.” She hissed with a smile. Brian pasted on a fake smile and nodded.

“Get out!” Nick shouted at her, then he shut the door. He little dog barked from the hallway. “Shut up, you ugly mut!” He cried, then he slumped back onto the bed.

“She has the hots for you, Littrell.” AJ said from the corner. He was sitting on the floor now, looking at Nick’s CD’s.

“I know, and it’s sickening. Hello, I have a wife!” Brian responded, playing with the wedding band on his finger with his thumb on the same hand. Suddenly, it was as if a bright light bulb had appeared above Nick’s head.

“That’s it!” Both Brian and AJ looked up at him, waiting to find out what was it.

“She likes you. So you gotta flirt with her. Gain her trust. And then, you can find a way to get the code for the safe. I can get the papers. And then she’s out on her ass!” Nick exclaimed, although he was careful to keep the tone of his voice down so Heather wouldn’t hear.

“Oh no! Not gonna fly. I am not flirting with her! I don’t like her! There is no way I’m gonna pretend to be attracted to her! No, Nick!” Brian protested, his face souring. AJ got up from the floor.

“I’ll do it.” He volunteered. Nick rolled his eyes and looked away. “What?” AJ asked innocently.

“We all know that you’re a smooth talker with the ladies. But, she’s not attracted to you. She wants Brian. No offense.” AJ just shrugged helplessly.

“None taken.” He went back to his corner and sat down.

“Come on Brian, you have to! Otherwise I’m gonna have to marry this girl!” Nick did have a point. Brian would hate for his best friend to be backed into a corner and forced to marry someone he didn’t care for. Someone he hated for that matter. He gave in.

“What the hell, what do I have to do?” Nick jumped up from the bed and ran to the closet to change shirts. He put on a ratty old t-shirt and kept on his jeans. Then he pulled off his baseball cap. Both his friends grew wide-eyed when they saw his hair.

“You dyed your hair brown????” Brian said, standing and looking at Nick in disbelief.

“Yeah. It’s the only way I can go out and see Ava without being detected by those sneaky ass photographers.” AJ went over to him and lifted some of the strands looking at the roots.

“Looks good. But question for you.... won’t your big green SUV give you away, genius?” Nick shook his head and grinned, deviously.

“Nope, and you wanna know why? Course you do, and I’ll tell you! I’m taking the Mazda!” He announced, overly excited. They both thought about it and remembered. They had rented a Mazda Millennia at the airport to get to Nick’s house in since Heather wouldn’t let him leave the house without her.

“Whoa, wait! How are you gonna go out with Heather on your ass?” AJ asked. Nick quickly tucked his brown hair back under his hat.

“I’m going downstairs. And you, you lure her in here and keep her in here until I leave. And AJ, you’ll give Brian the signal that I’ve gone. I’ll only be out for thirty minutes, I swear. And once I get back, you can cut things off with her.” Brian shook his head and went to the window, looking out at Heather sitting on the deck in her bikini, probably tanning.

“What if she wants more than just... flirtation?” He asked. Nick and AJ looked at each other and smiled. When Brian saw this, he grew uneasy.

“Dude, you really have to learn how to tease! If she wants more, give her just enough to calm her down. Touch her cheek. Sit close to her. Tell her how beautiful she is. Just sweep her off of her feet. Chicks love that kind of thing, you know?” AJ explained, patting Brian on the shoulder. Then he and Nick made their way downstairs.

As soon as they reached the bottom step, Heather’s dog, Antoinette, started to alert her. She got up and went into the house. Taking her sunglasses off and smiling.

“And just where are you off to, sweetness?” She asked, in her now annoying English accent. Nick and AJ turned and looked at her.

“We’re going in the garage. I wanna show AJ something I added to the Prowler, if you don’t mind.” She smiled again and twiddled her fingers at him.

“Whatever...” She replied, waving them off. Then she turned and went back outside.

Upstairs, Brian opened the window above the deck. Then he sat in the chair by the window and started strumming Nick’s guitar. Heather heard the beautiful music and knew who had to have been playing. She took Antoinette and went back into the house, then up to Nick’s room.

“That’s lovely. What is it?” She asked, putting the dog down and walking over to Brian, sitting on the corner of the bed closest to him.

“It’s nothing. Just something I’m working on. Why, you like it?” She nodded and leaned forward. Purposely giving Brian a better view of her cleavage.

“Yes, I do. Go on, keep playing.” Brian complied and started to play again, this time singing a little. She reached out and touched his thigh. Brian shuttered at her touch. It grossed him out and he wished he could hit her hand with the guitar. But he had to help his friend.

He stopped suddenly and Heather looked surprised. “That’s all I got so far.” He informed her, then he put the guitar down.

“You know, you’re not like most yanks around here.” She said, leaning forward more still.

“How’s that?”

“Well, you’re kind. You’re soft spoken. You don’t have that boisterous demeanor like the other blokes around here do. You remind me of the men back home. I respect that.” She moved her hand farther up his thigh towards his crotch. Brian stood up quickly to avoid this. Then he sat next to her on the bed.

“You know, I feel the same way about you.” He lied. And the words that came out of his mouth made him want to vomit.

“Is that a fact?”

“Of course it is. I have never met a woman who carried herself to gracefully. And, I just can’t put it into words.” He literally couldn’t.

“You can’t mean that. I’ve been acting a little out of sorts lately. You must be sore with me for blackmailing your friend.” She looked away and Brian brought her face back to his.

“Not exactly. What you do with him is your business. And I don’t care about all of that. What I do care about is us, right here, right now.” He was so close to her then that each could both feel the other’s breath on their skin.

“Hey Brian, Nick wants to know when you’re coming down!” AJ called from the bottom of the stairs. Brian knew that Nick didn’t need him downstairs, so AJ must have been giving him the signal that Nick was gone. This meant that he only had a half an hour to keep this up with Heather.

Nick was already at Subway by now. He had called Ava and told her to meet him there immediately, because they didn’t have much time. She showed up at the fast food restaurant only seconds after he did.

“Over here.” He said to her across the room. She saw his hand in the air and sat down. But it was only then she noticed his hair.

“Oh my God....” Was her reaction. He smiled and ran his fingers through it.

“Yeah, not quite as noticeable to the press.” And he was right. Darker hair made him look like a completely different person. She had a Gilligan-like hat on and her glasses. And her hair was tied up in a bun. So she wasn’t as easy to recognize either.

“You haven’t even been gone but a day and I’m missing you like crazy.” Ava blushed. He took her hand and played with her fingers.

“Well, you better quit. Cause Heather’s not goin’ anywhere.” A sad look came across her face.

“But she is! And soon, too. Brian and AJ caught the red-eye down here. They were in Georgia, but I called them last night and asked them to come. We already have a plan of getting those test results back from Heather.” Ava felt confused and Nick could see it in her expression.

“And your plan would be?”

“Well, Heather has some weird attraction to Brian. When she first met him, she was all weak in the knees. And now it’s even more obvious. So, he’s gonna flirt around with her, gain her trust, and then get us the code. He’s messing with her mind right now so that I could slip away to see you. But enough about Heather, how are you? Still having morning sickness?” She nodded.

“Yeah. It just doesn’t go away. It was really bad this morning, but I feel fine now. Accept sometimes, I get really hot. Even though the air conditioning in the hotel is blasting. It’s weird.” She smiled.

“It’s so amazing. You’ve got a little baby growing inside of you. I see pregnant women all the time. And I hung around Mom when she was pregnant with Leslie, Aaron, and Angel. But I feel so... like I’m a part of this. Every time I touch your stomach, I feel so odd... I can’t explain it.” She reached over the table and touched his face.

“I know exactly what you mean. A part of you is in me. You’re experiencing what most fathers-to-be feel. Anxiousness. But you can’t enjoy it. And I can’t enjoy it. Because it will make giving the baby up when its born all the more difficult.” Nick knew she was right. They were both far too young to be having a baby. But parenting one? That was completely out of the question, so they just could not allow themselves to look forward to it.

They continued to talk about how Ava was doing until Nick glanced at his watch and realized the time. He had only 3 minutes to get home and relieve his best friend.

“Shit... I’m running late. Listen, keep your ears open and sleep light tonight. I will be calling you and letting you know how things are. But right now, I really gotta go. Brian’s gonna kill me if he has to sit alone with Heather a second more.” He got up from the table and kissed Ava on the lips. Then he rushed out of the restaurant and to the blue Mazda. Ava sighed as she watched him speed off.

Heather and Brian were still sitting on Nick’s bed talking when he returned home.

“This chemistry between us can’t go unacknowledged. But there is one problem... your wife.” She whispered into his ear. Brian got up and started to pace.

“I only married Lee because she’s a wonderful woman. And I wasn’t sure if I’d ever find someone as sweet and honest and her. But now that I’ve found you, I don’t know what I’ll do.” Brian said. He was beginning to have fun with this. He wasn’t a liar. But now he was deceiving Heather with the greatest of ease.

“She doesn’t have to know.”

“Who doesn’t have to know what?” Nick asked. A huge smile grew on Brian’s face. Nick was back and just in time. AJ was behind him, peaking in to see Heather, still in her bikini, sitting on Nick’s bed.

“Ok, show’s over. Get out of my room!” Nick snapped at Heather. She rolled her eyes and got up from the bed. Then she pushed passed both Nick and AJ. AJ shut the door and they waited until they knew she was back in her room.

“So, what happened?” Brian sat down in the chair by the window and shined his nails on his shirt, proudly.

“The girl’s in love.” He bragged with a sly grin.

“Hell yeah!” Both AJ and Nick said in unison, praising Brian’s work.

“Now if you’ll excuse me, I need to call my beloved wife.” He took Nick’s cordless phone and went into the bathroom. It was the only place he could be where Heather wouldn’t listen in, and neither would the guys. He did tell Leighanne about Heather and their plans. And she found it funny. His relationship with his wife was strong, and another woman lusting after Brian didn’t affect Lee in the slightest. That’s just how much trust she had in him.

“Now all we gotta do is let Brian work his magic. And soon, she’ll be eating out of his hand.” AJ slumped down on the bed and waited for Nick to respond.

“You’re absolutely right. And I know just how we’re gonna get that code. Brian will have to get Heather to show him the test results. And when she’s opening the code, we’ll be outside looking in, taking pictures of the combination. Then. Once they leave, we sneak in, and BAM! Bye-bye Heather Errington!” AJ looked at Nick as though he had literally lost his mind.

“Take pictures of the combination? Nicky, you’re not James Bond.”

“Yes! Take pictures!” AJ thought about it, and there was no other way to catch the combination without being right up next to her hand as she did it. Then something came to him.

“But dude, there is no way you can take pictures fast enough to catch the numbers and directions. How about a video camera???” Nick clapped his hands together loudly at AJ’s suggestion. Then he went in his closet, pulling out his camera case.

“Let’s try this out.” They rushed out of the room and Antoinette started up. Brian heard this and knew they had left the room. He opened the door and looked around.

“I gotta call you back later, honey. They’re up to something.” After saying his farewells, he ran downstairs after them and joined them outside. Heather was standing at the top of the stairs calling Nick’s name.

“We’re just talking. Go back to bed, psycho!” Nick screamed to her from the front door. She put her middle finger up at him and went back to bed.

Nick turned the camera on and kneeled down in the bushes in front of his house. He asked Brian to go in and open the curtains. Once this was done, he told AJ to write something tiny on a piece of paper and tape it to the wall. AJ did as he was told too. Then the testing began.

Nick zoomed in as far as he could, then he focused the lense on the paper. When he saw what AJ had written, he took his face away from the camera and looked at his tattooed friend with scorn.

“69, 69, 69?” AJ shrugged and then smiled sheepishly.

“You told me to write something small. You didn’t say what to write small.” He said, justifying his actions.

“Anyway, this is about the same distance Heather’s safe is from her front window. We’ll be able to see exactly what her combination is.” Brian nodded with approval.

“Smooth, Carter.”




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