I've got the excuses for this chapter and they involve deaths, stress, busy schedules, work, plain old laziness, and writer's block. However, I won't bore you with the details and will just get right on in to the latest chapter, but I do want to say, I am sorry for the almost three month delay and I really don't know how you put up with me.

Please Read&Review, I truly do appreciate and thank you so so much to those that already have.

The next installment shall now begin with two friends who used to be so close…

Shoddy façade

"Lucas," Haley whispered through the bedroom window she always had simply climbed through for the past eight or so years. However, now simply barging in during this situation just didn't feel right.

A second passed and Lucas appeared at the window, a harsh look on his face. He didn't at all seem like he had been asleep, which surprised Haley seeing as how it was 3:30 in the middle of the night.

"Luke please," Haley begged her best friend, she already felt tears at her eyes and didn't know why, but everything of the past twelve hours was piling up and she needed to let it out soon.

At the sound of his best friend right before a breakdown, Lucas instantly softened. His face turned from a mask of anger to a look of concern as he opened his window and hugged Haley tightly. There are some things that run deeper and more widespread than anger, some things you just can't ignore, and friendship is one of them.

Haley began to cry into his shoulder, letting everything out, but then she saw a figure on Lucas' bed. A figure that was bloody and bruised, Mouth, passed out on Lucas' bed.

"LUKE!" Haley shouted, causing Mouth to stir for a moment, her tears instantly dried.

"Shh!" Lucas said quietly as he pulled Haley into the hallway, so she didn't wake Mouth. "Dan kidnapped Mouth. Nathan went over to the beach house to see if Dan could somehow help stop you or something, and saw Mouth tied up in the dining room with Dan and Keith fighting in the kitchen."

"Nathan was the savior," Keith said, his voice laced with hints of pain, as he limped back from the kitchen. "Danny and I would've been at it all night if he hadn't had shown up when he did."

"Is Nathan all right?" Haley asked, the concern painfully obvious in her voice.

"He's had a bad night," Lucas said quietly, a fresh chill in his voice. "He comes clean to a reporter about everything, gets sexually assaulted by a crazed freshman, has his wife slap him, sees the truth about his father, helps knock out his father, and still has to deal with complications with his one true love, his wife. Tell me do you think Nathan's all right?"

Haley met Lucas' glare and was about to respond, to point out to Lucas why she and Nathan are better apart, how there were too many things separating them, when the phone rang. As everyone knows, a phone call in the middle of the night is never good.

Everyone froze as they waited for Karen to finish the phone call that she had picked up immediately. A few painfully silent moments later, Karen hung up. She walked up the hallway and fell into Lucas' strong arms.

"Dan wasn't at the beach house when the police got there, nor was the gun he keeps in his desk drawer. The police are coming now, they think we're all in grave danger."

It had been a stressful night to say the least, and the morning wasn't an improvement. Haley hadn't gotten any sleep, nor had Lucas, nor Brooke, nor Karen, nor Keith. Mouth had, but only because he was passed out due to his injuries. Haley, Lucas, Brooke, Karen, and Keith had all been taken to a police protected hotel room for the remainder of the night while the cops searched for Dan.

"Any sign of him?" Keith asked an officer with slight stubble sitting in a chair by the door who had just been intensely listening to his police raidio.

"No. That was just an idiot who radioed in an average speeder. I thought it was some good news, but there's nothing on either of them."

Haley's blood ran a little colder. There hadn't been any sign of Nathan since the night before and after his last voice mail to Haley, he had turned off his phone. No one had any idea where he was or how to reach him, for all anyone knew he could be dead at the side of the road, Dan's latest victim.

The thought of Nathan's body cold, unmoving, pale, and battered. The nightmare that never again could Nathan tempt her away from the tour, never could he remind her of all the good times despite the bad. The thought that Nathan, who wanted to live life as much as he could, could be silenced and stopped forever made Haley run to the bathroom for probably the tenth time since they had arrived at the hotel.

Brooke saw Haley rush to the bathroom, tears in her eyes, and followed her. Brooke held back Haley's hair as she threw up in the toilet.

It had been four in the morning when there had been a rough knock on the apartment door. Brooke had searched for something, anything, to use as a weapon and the best she had found was a sewing needle. Instead of answering the door, Brooke moved to her bathroom, crouched low in her shower, and dialed Lucas' number to let him know if something happened, she really did love him.

After three rounds of knocking, she heard the apartment door open, but it hadn't been broken into. It sounded as if someone had used a key to open the door, which didn't make sense to Brooke, if someone had a key why didn't they just open the door to begin with?

Brooke stayed in her hiding place when a low voice called out, "Miss Davis, this is the Tree Hill Police Department. We are here to help, not arrest you, just please, let us know where you are."

Brooke didn't know why the police would want anything to do with her or why she should believe this stranger, but then she heard it: Lucas' tired voice, "Brooke, this is real. Please, Cherry, let us know you're okay."

Brooke climbed out of her shower, "I'm here, I'm okay. Lucas, what's going on?" She asked when she walked out to see three police officers and an exhausted looking Lucas staring at her, the officers all had their guns drawn too.

"Dan…we think he's finally snapped. Keith has enough on him to finally bring him down, but we all think he's going to take as many with him as he can. So everybody he may go after is being taken to a safe house."

"Broody," Brooke whispered as she took a few steps towards him. Brooke could see that everything happening was slowly tearing Lucas Scott apart and she didn't know how much of him would be left when the dust finally settled.

Lucas wasn't the most comfortable with showing emotion. He was better at it than Nathan, that was for sure, but that didn't mean he liked to wear it on his sleeve, and Brooke was usually good at letting him off the hook about his feelings. But tonight, Lucas could barely keep everything together, which was why when Brooke pushed herself against Lucas Scott and held him to her, he collapsed and let his large emotional wall fall, letting Brooke inside.

Brooke was Lucas' foundation, she held him together, the whole ride back to the safe house in the undercover cop car, Brooke just held Lucas as he just laid his head in her lap.

Once again, Brooke Davis saved Lucas Scott.

"I'm sorry Brooke," Haley said quietly as she laid herself down on the cool tile floor of the bathroom. "I should be able to hold myself together better…I shouldn't be this weak."

"Shh Tutor-Girl," Brooke said quietly as she soothingly rubbed Haley's back. "You're only showing how caring of a person you are…" Brooke's tone acquired more of its normal tone as she continued, "and the feeling you refuse to admit, no matter how many times it bites you and shoves itself in your face."

Haley managed a small laugh, "Oh yeah? And what feeling is that?"

"That you truly love Nathan Scott more than anything. No matter what's happened between you two, you're always worried about him Haley…Don't you think it's finally time you man up and admit you really are scared to lose him?"

"It's not that simple Brooke," Haley said as she sat up and explained to Brooke, frustrated, "No matter how close Nathan and I get, we're always driven apart, and it's always by the same things. We're just going in a circle of fights about Chris, the tour, how angry and hurt we both are…"

"And how you're both too stubborn and afraid to admit what you want most of all?" Brooke added, cocking her eyebrow. "Don't you see Tutor-Girl? If you would just tell Nathan you love him more than the tour, but you still want to live, things would be so much simpler. Just tell him, you're scared too, but deep down you know you two will be just fine, as long as your remember your love."

Haley sat quiet as she remembered the past few months, all the times with Nathan. Living in the moment had seemed the right solution at the time, ignoring their past and future, but in the end, had it really helped? Neither were ready to let go of each other or their dreams, and everything was bound to crash into each other one day.

"'Love is not love which alters when it alteration finds,'" Brooke whispered to Haley.

"Shakespeare's sonnet 116…"

"That quote always makes me think of you two. Tutor-Girl, if you and Nathan have true love…it's still there despite all the troubles you guys have faced…You just have to find it again and admit to it, no more running."

Haley nodded.

She finally understood what Brooke was saying to her and she knew what she had to do: She had to go to the tutor center and settle things with Nathan once and for all. It wasn't right to keep breaking each other's hearts like they had been, either they were together or they weren't.

Either their love was real or it wasn't, and it was time for Haley to finally decide which it was.

"Excuse me, officer," Haley said timidly to the same officer Keith had spoken to earlier.

The man turned his head towards Haley to show he was listening.

"I need to get out of here."

The officer laughed and shook his head. "Sorry darlin', no one is leaving this room until we get the all clear. It's not safe for you around town right now."

"I know that. That's why I'm leaving Tree Hill for good right now. There's a flight in forty-five minutes to New York City. If you let me leave now, I can still catch it."

The officer gave Haley a hard stare before he turned to his radio. "HQ, this is Officer Stanton, Songbird wants to fly the coop, the big coop. Permission to call a secured cab?"

There was static and the officer nodded his head.

He turned around a second later. "Your cab will be here in ten minutes. If there are any developments we'll give you a phone call."

Haley nodded seriously, accepting her decision.

That was when there was a loud crash behind her. For a second, Haley thought Dan had somehow gotten into the hotel room.

She quickly turned only to see Lucas fuming, a broken lamp at his feet and Brooke hanging onto his arm desperately, while maintaining a glare of her own at Haley.

"You're just going to leave," Lucas said, his voice a little more than a growl.

Never had Haley seen Lucas this angry.

"You make him think you're back for good, make him forget the hurt and pain, and now, WHEN WE'RE GETTING HUNTED BY OUR FATHER, you're going to leave him?!" Brooke lost her grip on Lucas and he walked threatingly towards Haley until he was just a few short inches away.

Karen and Keith walked slowly towards Lucas, trying to calm him down.

"Nathan knew this could happen," Haley said quietly. "I told him already that I was leaving…He knows."

Lucas raised his hands to his head and shut his eyes in exasperation, "You're not the best friend I had…" He lowered his hands, opened his eyes and looked into Haley's with a searching look. In a deadly quiet voice he asked, "Where did you leave her? My best friend would never leave anyone, let alone her husband, in a time of desperate crisis." His voice got louder as he asked, "What did you do to Haley!?"

There was a moment's silence when the officer cleared his throat, "Sorry to interrupt this pow-wow, but Mrs. Scott, if you want to leave, you need to put this big hat and sunglasses on, and go now."

Haley nodded and put the wide sun hat over her blond locks. She waved a little wave to everyone, and as she got to the door she heard Lucas say in the deadly quiet tone, "She's not Mrs. Scott officer, it's just Miss James."

Haley quickly walked out the door and into the waiting cab, leaving everything behind while she hid under a crummy disguise.

Brooke was walking through Tree Hill High hand-in-hand with Lucas.

"It's so weird," Brooke said when they arrived at Lucas' locker.

Lucas didn't answer, there were several things that were weird right now and didn't want to guess which one of the hundreds of options to which Brooke was referring.

Even though he didn't make a reply, Brooke knew he was listening.

"I mean," she began, "how things have gone back to pretty much normal here."

"But to us things are still messed up," Lucas finished as he glanced at the lockers surrounding his. One was Haley Scott's the other belonged to Nathan Scott.

"It's like we're in a different universe from everyone else at this school," Brooke continued as Lucas started trading books with his locker. "It's been two weeks since the accident and people have already forgotten it happened pretty much."

"That's how it works Brooke," Lucas said, a hint of bitterness in his voice as he thought of when Keith died and how people threw a party where he had been murdered. "If people aren't directly connected to a tragedy, they move on with the world, which keeps madly spinning. While the ones who were hurt most, who desperately need to move forward, are the ones stuck in the tragedy."

Brooke reached for Lucas' hand again, "But at least with this tragedy things will get better right? Haley will wake up and Nathan will bounce back to normal! Then everyone really can move on…right Luke?"

Lucas sighed and finally shut his locker with his free hand. He looked down at his and Brooke's intertwined fingers and then back at her face, "do you ever get the feeling something bad is about to happen?"

Brooke thought for a moment, "Yes, except I try to ignore it and live in the present because, feeling or not, something bad is going to happen at some point. But I'd rather not concentrate on that and enjoy the good times that are also bound to happen."

"What I mean is," Lucas said slowly as they started to walk from the school to Brooke's car since Lucas still wasn't allowed to drive, "have you ever gotten the feeling that things are bad, but they're about to get way worse and there is no way you're going to recover from how bad they're about to get?"

"No," Brooke said quietly as she looked up at Lucas, worry etched onto her features.

"That's the feeling I have right now Brooke, and I'm worried, about Nathan and Haley."

"Damn it," the deep voice whispered into the tiny microphone attached to his shirt. "How can you be sure?"

There was a pause while the person on the other end responded. The man slammed his fist on the nearest hard surface.

"Shit. Alright Smits….call in the S.W.A.T. team, it looks like we're gonna have a school massacre on our hands."

There was another pause while the other end processed this information.

"Of course I know what the repercussions will be if I'm wrong. Widespread panic, my cover will be blown, and we will have missed what may be our one shot of catching Dan Scott….But Smits, if I'm right and we don't do anything…How many are going to die today?"

The man ran a frustrated hand through his reddish-blond hair.

"I'm going to the school right now Smits, you just make sure I get back-up within the hour. Special Agent Donavan out."