A Window to the Past – Chapter 11

Washington D.C.

'Alright, George, so what's next on the list?' Brandon asks him, rolling his chair into George's cube.

'Well, I'm not making much progress on the Jones case, but I think I may have a lead with someone who may be powerful enough to get that kid out of going to jail,' George says with a worried look on his face.

'What's wrong?' Brandon asks him.

George turns his head and looks at Brandon. He takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly.

'As we all know, politicians are crooked and will do almost anything to stay in power, right?'

Brandon nods his head and waits for George to continue.

'I think the deputy Mayor called in a favor with a few of his old school buddies,' George says, handing Brandon a photo.

Brandon looks at the photo and immediately recognizes a much younger version of the deputy mayor standing with four other guys in front of a brick building.

'Who are these guys?'

'I'm not sure about all of them, but that one,' George says, pointing to one of the guys, 'is Vincent Spagnolo.'

'Spagnolo?' Brandon says, confused.

'Jeez, Brandon, don't you ever read the news?' George says with a laugh. 'Spagnolo was the mastermind behind the botched murder of Nick Venezia, head of the largest mob family in New Jersey.'

Brandon's eyes open as wide as they will go as he stares down at the picture in his hand.

'Wait a second here George,' Brandon says, 'Are you telling me that the deputy mayor was and may still be friends with a hit man for the mob?'

'Can't get anything past you, huh?' George says with a smile. 'I think he's still knows and is friends with several hit men from the mob.'

'Do you really think that a guy like Spagnolo would even care about getting some snot-nosed kid out of doing jail time?'

'I don't know, Brandon, they may not be connected at all, but we're going to find out,' George says.

'What do you want me to do?'

'Start looking around for him in the area. Here is a list of known aliases that he's used in the past,' George says, handing him a piece of paper. 'Make sure you check the city and any surrounding states and let me know if something interesting pops up.'

'Okay, I'm on it,' Brandon says.

New York

Brenda walks down the street with Donna's arm wrapped in hers and the boys following closely behind.

'So, you guys had a pretty uneventful drive from California then?' Brenda asks.

'Yeah, next time anyone wants to get from one side of the country to the other, we're flying,' Steve says.

Steve leans closer to Dylan and says almost under his breath, 'There is nothing worse than spending several days in a cramped car with two women who have no interest in you whatsoever.'

Dylan laughs and then shrugs when he sees Brenda shoot him a look.

'So, Bren, where are we going?' Steve asks her.

'You'll see.'

Brenda turns the corner and walks her friends down one more block. She slows her pace a little and waits for Donna to notice where they are. It takes several minutes and then Donna stops short.

Steve tries as hard as he can not to crash into her as she stands in the middle of the sidewalk with her mouth open.

'Damn it, Donna, why did you stop? I almost ran you over,' Steve says.

'Shush,' Donna says and just points across the street.

'Oh, man, Brenda, you had to bring us here?' Steve whines.

'I will not let Donna leave this city without at least seeing Saks,' Brenda says with a smile.

'I love you, Brenda,' Donna says as she walks like a zombie across the street to the door.

'Dylan is going to take Steve to FAO Schwarz and give us some time, okay?' Brenda says.

Dylan nudges Steve up the street and waves to the girls.

'Well, looks like it's just you and me, Steve,' Dylan says.

Instead of walking up to the toy store, Dylan steers Steve across the street to Rockefeller Center. They find a bench and sit down.

'So, how's Brandon?' Dylan asks.

Washington D.C.

'George?' Amy says walking into his cube.

'Yeah?'

'Look, I totally forgot, but I have an appointment this afternoon and I have to leave a little early. Is that okay?'

'Oh, sure, just make sure you're down at the Capitol Building tomorrow morning,' George says.

'You got it,' Amy says. She goes back to her desk and grabs her purse. She stops by Brandon's cube on the way out.

'Hey, are we getting together later?' Amy says, putting her best smile on her face.

Brandon looks up and immediately gets a knot in his stomach. 'Uh, yeah, sure,' he says, trying to hide how uncomfortable he felt.

'Do you want to meet me for dinner at the Old Ebbit?' she asks.

Brandon shrugs and tries to smile. 'Sure,' he finally gets out.

Amy continues to smile at him as she leaves the office. She goes directly to her apartment and picks up the phone.

'I got out of there early and I made plans to get him out of the apartment. Get over here now so that we can plan this out and get this over with, okay?'

'Fine, I'll be right there,' the voice says.

Ten minutes later the door opens and a large, broad shouldered man walks in.

'Great, you're here,' she says, 'let's get to work.'

New York

'Brandon seems to be doing alright,' Steve tells Dylan. 'He seems to like his job and has already found a girl to be with, so how bad could it be?'

Dylan smiles and shakes his head. 'Well, that's not surprising at all. It sounds exactly like Brandon.'

'Yeah,' Steve says.

'How did Kelly take the news?'

Steve gives Dylan a quizzical look and then quickly realizes that anything Brenda knew, he probably knew too.

'I'm not sure, actually. I think she decided not to come with us so that she could make a move on him while we're gone or something.'

'Yeah, probably, he's the only one of us left you know,' Dylan says with a smile.

Steve starts to laugh out loud. 'So, how have you been? How did you and Brenda hook back up?'

'Ah, it's a long, boring story, Steve. The only thing that matters now is that we're together and with everything we've been through recently, I think we're stronger than ever,' Dylan says with confidence.

'Well, that's nice to hear. I hope you guys stay that way for a long, long time,' Steve says.

Dylan looks sideways at his friend, trying to figure out if he was for real. Hearing something like that come out of Steve's mouth was not normal. Dylan puts his hand up to Steve's forehead.

'Are you feeling alright?' he says.

Steve laughs. 'I'm fine,' he says swatting Dylan's hand away from his head. 'My point is the less drama there is within this group, the better off we are and the less I have to sit around and listen to Kelly and Donna talk about it.'

Dylan smiles and turns his head in time to see the girls exit the store across the street. He stands up and walks to the sidewalk and tries to wave them down. Brenda finally notices them and comes over to where they are sitting.

'Okay,' Steve says, putting his arm around Donna's shoulders, 'please, oh, please tell me we are done shopping for the rest of the time we are here?'

Washington D.C.

Brandon finishes working for the day and after not finding much so far on his mob guy, he reluctantly gets up from his desk and leaves the office to meet up with Amy. He had already planned to just walk in, tell her that he couldn't have dinner with her because he was still entertaining his friends and then go home.

He stands outside of the restaurant and takes a deep breath. He really did like her, but he just couldn't help feeling a little uncomfortable knowing that she either lied to him or to his friends about her family.

He walks in and sees her sitting at the bar. She turns her head just as he walks in and smiles.

'I almost thought that you forgot about our date,' she says, looking at her watch.

'Yeah, sorry about that I got hung up on this research I was doing,' Brandon says.

'It seems to me that you're not too into this, Brandon,' she says. 'Is something bothering you?'

Brandon puts his hands into his pockets and shuffles his feet.

'Listen,' Amy says, putting her hand on his arm, 'why don't we get out of here and go back to your apartment and talk about it, okay?'

Brandon lifts his head to look at her and considers her offer. She looked sincere and he slowly nods his head in agreement.

New York

Dylan and Brenda walk Steve and Donna back to the train station.

'I had such a wonderful day,' Donna says. 'I'm so glad we decided to come up here.'

Brenda smiles at her friend. 'Me too, Donna,' she says, giving her friend a hug.

'Well, at least it wasn't a total bust, I did get to see Madison Square Garden and eat some great food,' Steve says.

'And hang out with Brenda and Dylan,' Donna adds with a smile.

Steve shakes Dylan's hand and pulls him into a hug. He moves to Brenda and leans down to hug her too.

'Have a safe trip back and tell Brandon and Kelly that I miss them,' Brenda says.

'You got it,' Donna says and waves goodbye.

Brenda and Dylan watch them disappear down the steps to catch their train. Dylan takes her hand and slowly weaves around the bustling station and back up to the street.

Brandon's Apartment

Kelly waits patiently for Brandon to return from work. She sits in front of the window looking out onto the street. She smiles to herself and goes over in her head what she planned to say to him.

She starts to think of his face and his smile. She thinks about the first time they met and the first time they kissed. She closes her eyes and tries to recreate the moment. A jingling at the door wakes Kelly from her fantasy world. She quickly moves to the sofa, crosses her legs, and pulls the edge of her dress higher up on her thigh.

She tosses her hair to one side and smiles seductively toward the door as it opens. Kelly's expression quickly turns to confusion as she sees a very large man enter the apartment. He doesn't notice her right away as he looks around the kitchen to find a good spot to hide out.

Kelly tries to scream but nothing comes out of her mouth. He turns quickly at the sound of her breath and charges toward her.

He grabs her arm and pulls her up. He puts both of her arms behind her back and holds them firmly so she cannot move.

'What are you doing here? You are supposed to be in New York with the rest of your pathetic friends,' he grunts at her.

'Ouch, you're hurting me,' Kelly finally chokes out. 'Who the hell are you and what do you want?'

'Damn,' he says mostly to himself, trying to figure out what to do with her. He pulls a pair of handcuffs from his back pocket and closes them around her wrists.

He throws her back down on the sofa and pulls out his phone. He sends a quick message, grabs Kelly, and pulls her toward the door. He takes one of Brandon's coats that was hanging next to the door and throws it around her to hide the handcuffs.

'One peep out of you and,' he stops, pulls a gun from his jacket and points it at her forehead.

Kelly swallows hard and feels the tears well up in her eyes as he shoves her out of the apartment and down the stairs.

Brandon tries as hard as he can to stay engaged in the conversation with Amy as they walk back to his apartment to talk. He barely notices when she stops talking to look at a message that came through her phone.

'Um, Brandon,' she says and stops walking.

'Yeah?'

'Do you, um, want to maybe get some take out or something to bring back with us? I'm kind of hungry,' she says, looking around for a restaurant they could duck into for a while.

Brandon feels the annoyance fill his chest and tries not to let it show on his face. He didn't event really want to be with her right now and if they get food he would have to spend even more time trying to be nice.

'I don't know, I don't really have an appetite right now,' he lies.

She notices a sandwich shop and just grabs him and pulls him inside. 'I need to get some food or I'm going to pass out and then we won't have a chance to talk,' she says, not looking at him.

Brandon sighs and shakes his head. 'I'm going to use the restroom. I'll be right back,' he says, glad for an excuse to leave.

As soon as he is out of sight, she opens her phone and sends a message. Now that the plan was completely screwed, they would have to account for not getting Brandon alone and abducting one of his friends. She decides not to wait around for him and runs out of the store.

Brandon comes out of the restroom and walks toward the line to find Amy. When he doesn't see her, he steps out onto the street to see if she was waiting outside.

'Great, she took off,' Brandon mutters to himself and starts walking slowly back to his apartment.

Amy enters her apartment to find Kelly sitting on her couch in handcuffs, gagged, and blindfolded.

'I cannot believe that this is happening,' she says to the large man standing next to Kelly.

'Look, we were misinformed. She was there when I went into the apartment. What was I supposed to do?'

Kelly sits quietly trying to place the voice she just heard. It sounded somewhat familiar, but she couldn't place where she had heard it before.

'You've got to call and tell her the situation, Nina. We're running out of time,' the man says.

'Fine, I will.' She picks up the phone and dials quickly.

Kelly leans closer to where the voices are coming from to try to gain as much information as possible about why she was taken from Brandon's apartment.

'It's me,' Kelly hears the voice say into the phone. 'Look we've got problems down here. The apartment wasn't empty and it's getting to the point where I think Brandon might be getting suspicious.'

Kelly straightens her posture when she hears the voice say Brandon's name. She tries to gasp, but ends up gagging from the cloth in her mouth.

'Oh my God, it's Amy! That's the voice!' Kelly thinks to herself. 'But didn't that guy call her Nina? Brandon was right, she's definitely hiding more than just that lie about her family.'

'I don't know what to tell you. This plan has fallen apart at every turn and now we have a hostage,' Kelly hears.

'Well, you should have thought about that when you hired us,' Nina says louder and with more anger.

'I'm sorry, but what exactly do you want us to do at this point?'

'Fine, we'll meet you there,' Nina says and slams the phone down.

'Grab her,' Kelly hears as the front door opens. The man grabs her arm and yanks her to a standing position and shoves her forward out of the apartment.

As Brandon enters his apartment the phone begins to ring.

'Hello?'

'Brandon, it's George,' he hears the voice say.

'Hey George, what's going on?'

'I have a lead on Spagnolo and I need to you meet me there.'

Brandon jots down the address of a bar as George tells him. 'Okay, I'll be right there.'

He rushes back out of the apartment and doesn't notice that there was no one there to greet him.

New York

Dylan and Brenda make their way back to the hotel. They enter the room and both flop face down on the bed at the same time.

'Oh, what an exhausting day this has been,' Brenda says into the comforter. She turns her head toward Dylan.

'How was rehearsal?' he asks her, stroking her back with his hand.

'Physical,' she says. 'The director had us in almost full body pads and made us do physical acting exercises the entire time.'

'Physical acting exercises?' Dylan asks with a puzzled look on his face.

'Yeah, comedies on the stage are funny most of the time because there are actors slipping on the floor, falling down stairs, getting hands closed in doors, that kind of thing. If you don't practice them, it comes off as very fake and not funny.'

'Oh, okay, like the Three Stooges, but on stage?'

Brenda laughs softly. 'Yup, just like that.' She leans in to kiss him, but is interrupted by the telephone ringing.

'Hello?' Brenda says. "Oh, hi, how are you?'

Dylan waits patiently while Brenda talks on the phone. He moves closer to her and starts to play with her hair.

Brenda closes her eyes as she feels Dylan's hands in her hair. She feels a tingling sensation throughout her body and tries to focus on what the person on the other end of the phone is saying.

'Really? Wow, that's great news. When can we see it?' Brenda says, snapping back to reality.

'Great, we'll meet you there.'

Brenda hangs up the phone and turns around to Dylan.

'The agent found us an apartment and since it's empty, we can see it right now,' she says with excitement.

'Wow, that was quick,' Dylan says.

'Not that I don't like this hotel, but I need a real kitchen,' Brenda says, getting up from the bed.

Washington D.C.

Donna and Steve step off of the train, still talking about their day in New York with Brenda and Dylan.

'I can't wait to tell Kelly and Brandon about Dylan!' Donna says.

'Do you think we should tell them, Donna? I mean, shouldn't we let Brenda tell them?' Steve asks her.

'Oh, come on, Steve, I'm sure that Brenda knows that I won't be able to keep quiet about it.'

Steve nods his head and smiles as they get up to the street and start walking back to Brandon's apartment. He listens to Donna recount every moment they had that day and doesn't notice that there is someone following them until she is grabbed from behind.

Steve turns quickly and feels a fist hit him squarely in the face and then everything goes black.