He glanced at his watch and realized that Carole would be home in a few hours. He decided to deal with the mail now rather than put if off until later. Grabbing a beer he headed to the living room and turned on the TV. Dumping the mail on the coffee table his eyes were immediately drawn to the hot pink envelope sitting in the middle of the pile. He recognized the envelope. He knew it would contain some type of threat aimed at him if he didn’t drop out of the race for the White House.

Sighing he picked up the envelope and figured he would read it before he handed it off to his Secret Service detail who handled such correspondence. He pulled out the folded piece of paper and as he opened it two 5x7 pictures fell out. They were taped together facing each other. “This is new,” he thought. Normally the envelopes contained pretty much the same thing; a folded sheet telling him to drop his bid for the White House. Burt had to admit that he secretly enjoyed reading some of the letters from this particular individual. The deaths were pretty inventive. Burt had not realized that a person could be poisoned, shot in the head, shot three more times, bludgeoned, castrated, and then thrown into a river only for the cause of death to be drowning.****

He noticed there was nothing written on the paper this time which was strange so he picked up the pictures and cut the tape holding them together. As soon as he turned them over his heart stopped.

The first picture was of Kurt standing in front of The Tower of London and the second one was of him standing with his arms spread wide looking up at the sky with Stonehenge in the background. Someone had taken a black marker and drawn a target and cross hairs on Kurt’s head with the words “KILL THE FAGS” scrawled at the bottom of the pictures.

Burt grabbed the envelope, shoved the pictures back in and headed out the door. He was in such a hurry that his protective detail had to scramble to keep up with him. He called the Ambassador spoke to him for a few minutes and then dialed his secretary and had her book him a seat on the next flight to London. He had a few hours before he was scheduled to be at the airport so he headed to the hospital to talk to Carole. He had never been this scared before in his entire life.

xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxooxoxoxoxoxox

Kurt had just finished getting ready for bed when he heard the knock at his door. Blaine had left after dropping him off about 30 minutes earlier and housekeeping didn’t normally knock on doors this late at night. He looked through the peephole and noticed the ambassador standing outside his hotel door. Kurt’s heart started beating fast. Something must have happened to his father. There was no other reason for the Ambassador to be here this late at night unless something was wrong. He yanked the door opened, “Is my father okay?” he blurted out.

“Your father is fine. I just spoke with him a few minutes ago and he wants me to take you to the embassy. He will be here by noon tomorrow.”

“Why?” asked Kurt.

“There is an issue with your safety and your dad wants to make sure you are safe until he gets here.”

“What kind of issue?”

“I don’t really have all the details Kurt. I just need to ensure your safety and the only place I can do that is in the embassy. Can you grab your stuff or do you want me to have someone pack and deliver all your clothes to the embassy?”

Kurt cringed at the thought of someone touching his clothes, “I can do it. I’ve been living out of a suitcase so there isn’t much to pack.” It took him about 20 minutes to gather all his belongings and before he knew it he was being shown his temporary lodging at the American Embassy.

Kurt was supposed to spend the following day with Blaine as normal and he worried about how to contact Blaine to let him know what was happening. He realized that he didn’t have Blaine’s phone number. His phone was a government issued phone that he was assigned as part of his protective detail and was not authorized to use for personal business other than contacting his father. Knowing he was going to be in Europe for the better part of the summer Kurt had cancelled his cell phone and used the internet to stay in contact with his Glee friends.

He had never had the need to call Blaine. Blaine had called him at the hotel a few times and the rest of the time they were together so there had never been a reason to exchange contact information. He figured that once his dad arrived in London he would take care of the problem and Kurt would be back in his hotel room by the end of the next day. He fell asleep confident in his dad’s ability to fix everything.

xoxoxoxoxoxoxo

Blaine arrived at the Holiday Inn and took the elevator up to Kurt’s room. He knocked on the door and waited for Kurt to open up. He waited a few minutes and when Kurt didn’t answer the door he knocked again with the same results.

“Excuse me, are you looking for Kurt?” Blaine looked up and he saw the housekeeper looking out of the room next door. He smiled and said, “Yes, have you seen him. I’m supposed to meet him here this morning.”

“He checked out last night. I got orders to clean his room this morning which surprised me since Kurt never mentioned he was leaving this soon.” Blaine wasn’t surprised that Kurt had befriended the help. His family liked to pretend that the help didn’t exist but this was one of the things Blaine loved…wait….loved??? “Where the hell did that come from?” he asked himself. He shook his head to clear his thoughts and thanked her and walked down to the reception desk.

“Good Morning, I’m supposed to meet my here this morning but it seems he checked out last night. Could you please verify that for me?” Blaine gave the receptionist Kurt’s name and room number.

“Yes, the occupant checked out last night.”

Blaine was confused. “Do you happen to know if he left any forwarding information?”

“I’m sorry sir, our privacy laws prevents us from giving out any information about our guests.”

“Did he leave any messages for Blaine Williams?”

The receptionist checked the computer and shook her head. “I’m sorry; I see no messages for you.” Blaine thanked her and left the hotel. His mind was racing. Where had Kurt gone and more importantly why did he leave without at least saying goodbye? He realized that he had no way to contact Kurt to get answers to his questions.

xoxoxoxoxoxoxo

Well shit – not only did Burt not solve the problem but now Kurt found himself on a plane headed to the United States. Kurt was having lunch in his room when his dad burst into his room grabbed him – nearly causing Kurt to choke on his turkey sandwich – and almost squeezed him to death.

“Dad, Dad, DAD!” yelled Kurt struggling to breathe and swallow the food in his mouth at the same time. Burt let him go and started grabbing Kurt’s stuff laying around the room and shoving things into his suitcases.

“What’s going on dad?” Kurt could tell something was wrong.

Burt sat on the bed and rubbed his eyes. He had not been able to sleep on the flight. He kept thinking about Kurt in danger and just couldn’t sleep. “Finish your lunch and then we are headed back to the airport. We have a flight out in 2 hours.”

“Why? I still have a few weeks left on my vacation. What happened? The ambassador didn’t give me any information?”

Burt pulled copies of the pictures out of his pocket. The Secret Service had the originals and were investigating but Burt had demanded copies. He handed them to Kurt.

“Who sent these?”

“They came in the mail just like the rest of the threats except this one was different.”

“Wait. What do you mean “the rest of the threats”? Kurt had not been aware that his father had been getting threats.

“Every so often I get letters telling me to drop out of the race. Every public official deals with this type of situation. It is not uncommon Kurt. There are a lot of crazy people out there. This one is different because these threats are always aimed at me – never at my family.”

“Do you really think someone would target me?”

“Doesn’t matter what I think or don’t think Kurt. I am taking you home with me and putting that protective detail back to work.”

“Can’t I just stay here? I’m not done looking at everything I want to see and Blaine…”

“Get your stuff ready, Kurt. We are leaving today. The one non-negotiable for me is your safety.” Burt had not forgotten that he had asked the Ambassador to investigate this Blaine individual. He needed to ask him if he had completed the investigation.

Kurt was sitting on the plane next to his dad fuming. He had wanted to leave a message for Blaine at the hotel but his father would not let him. He had gone into protective mode like a bear with its cub and Kurt was not amused.

xoxoxxoxoxoxoxo

“Damn,” muttered the Ambassador. He had just finished reading the report the Marine captain had just handed him. They had run the name Blaine Williams through their database and while there were a few Blaine Williams none of them were between the ages of 18-20 years old, recent Eton graduates or prospective Cambridge law school students. He sighed and quickly picked up his phone.

“Hello.”

“Hello Congressman. I have the results of the check on one Blaine Williams. It seems that no such person fitting the perimeters of the query we submitted exists.”

“Are you sure?”

“Our searches are pretty thorough, Sir. Is there anything further you want us to do?”

“No. I do want to thank you for helping me out with my son. I owe you a bid debt Ambassador. Please let me know if there is ever a chance I can repay you for your help.” Burt hung up the phone and was glad that he had made the decision to bring Kurt back to the States.

xoxoxoxoxoxoxox

When Blaine got home from the hotel his parents were waiting for him. “Blaine, can you please come here?” asked his father.

“I’ve got some stuff to do dad, can this wait?” Blaine really wasn’t in the mood to deal with his father at the moment.

“No it can’t wait. We just got back from our meeting with the Queen and we wanted to let you know what was decided about your future.”

Blaine shook his head and walked into his dad’s study. “What do you mean you want to talk about what was decided about my future? Don’t I get a say in my future?” Blaine could feel his blood pressure rising. He was already stressed out about Kurt and this was not helping him at all.

“The Queen mentioned that you wanted to attend school in the colonies and when we informed her that you had already accepted your position at Cambridge a compromise was made. For some reason she feels you should be allowed to choose where you want to go to school. We decided you should attend NYU’s satellite campus in London for the first semester and if you like it then you can attend school in New York starting in January. If you end up not liking it then you can switch to Cambridge in January.”

“Wait. What? Do you think Cambridge is going to be okay with that?”

“Really Blaine? Have you forgotten who you are? They will bend over backwards to have someone from the Royal Family attending their prestigious university. That is the least of your problems. Think about it and let us know by tomorrow afternoon what you have decided. We need to make plans.”