"𝐀𝐅𝐓𝐄𝐑 𝐖𝐄 𝐓𝐀𝐊𝐄 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐌𝐔𝐆 𝐒𝐇𝐎𝐓𝐒, 𝐖𝐄 𝐁𝐑𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐌 𝐃𝐎𝐖𝐍 𝐇𝐄𝐑𝐄 where they wait to be interviewed by the arresting officers." Olivia stood quietly, waiting for Phil to make his phone call while her hand held up the phone — his hands handcuffed to her's and Alan's making the whole situation uncomfortable for all of them. An officer walked around with a group of kids, using the four of them as an example of felons for their field trip. "Trust me, kids, you do not wanna be sitting on these benches. We call this place Loserville."
All the kids laughed at his words, trailing behind him as he moved on. One kid emerged from the group, specifically walking up to Alan to snap a photo on his phone. Glaring at the child, he lifted his leg up in the air to kick the phone out of his hand.
"Alan!" Liv scolded, "We're in enough trouble already, don't make it worse by assaulting a child."
Alan frowned, "He started it."
"Hey, Tracy! It's Phil." This drew Olivia's attention, anxiously looking at him while he spoke to her sister in law, holding in her breath as she tried to listen in. "We are at the spa in the hotel." Phil lied, "Of course. Why wouldn't he be around?"
Liv felt on edge at his words. She knew Tracy would try and get to the bottom of things if she didn't know anything and try to figure out why her soon to be husband wasn't contacting her and wondering why Liv wasn't messaging her that everything was under control. "Um..." Phil then paused, trying to think of something to make their questionable actions seem believable.
"We made a deal, no talking to girlfriends. So we're all calling each other— including Liv. Uh, you are not gonna believe this. We got comped an extra night at the hotel." He spoke to Tracy with fake enthusiasm, hoping it was convincing enough. "Yeah. The suite is— It's ridiculous. It's out of control. There's, like, room service and a butler. I mean, just the works. So, we're thinking of spending the night here and then we're gonna come back totally relaxed in the morning."
"Wenneck, Billings, Price, Garner. Room 3." A police officer yelled out to them, thankfully cutting their conversation short.
"Okay, Trace, I gotta go. We'll talk to you later." Liv quickly put the phone down, looking at Phil with expectant eyes.
"She totally bought it."
"Come on, chop-chop."
Sat in the small interrogation room, Olivia felt her leg move up and down at a rapid pace in anticipation, waiting for their punishment for committing a felony — or probably multiple that they weren't aware of — now having to face the consequences of their actions.
"Lady, gentlemen." An officer shut the door behind him, walking forward. "We've got some good news, and we've got some bad news. The good news is we found your Mercedes."
Phil chuckled in relief — now they didn't have to worry Alan's dad if something happened to the car. "That's great news." Stu commented.
"Yeah, it's over an impound right now. We picked it up at 5 am this morning...parked in the middle of Las Vegas Boulevard."
"That's weird." Phil mumbled.
"Yeah, that is weird. There was also a note." The officer pulled up a small piece of paper from the file he held, "It says, uh, "Couldn't find a meter, but here's four bucks." The bad news is we can't get you in front of a judge until Monday morning."
"What?" Liv blurted out with widened eyes. She could imagine the immediate uproar she was going to face while explaining this to Tracy and her family if they were to be stuck in a jail cell.
"Oh, no, uh, officer, that's just impossible." Phil stammered, "No, we need to be in LA tomorrow for a wedding."
"You stole a police car." Officer Garden said plainly.
"We didn't steal anything. Um, we found it." Stu told them.
"Yeah, if anything, we deserve a reward or something, like a trophy."
Olivia internally groaned at Alan's words, seeing how the officer's face shifted into frustration.
"I see assholes like you every day."
"Every fucking day."
"You think we want to be here?" Olivia snapped, silencing the officers. "You think we want to be stuck in this shit show?" Stu and Phil turned their head's at her attitude towards the police officer — something completely abnormal in her nature.
"Woah, she's feisty. You think it's funny to get drunk and steal a cop car, sweetheart?"
The woman scoffed, "Maybe you shouldn't leave your car unsupervised, asshole. It probably was hilarious considering we were severely intoxicated by the way."
"You have some attitude for someone who just got arrested."
Phil interjected, "Uh— Sir, if I may, I'm assuming that that squad car belongs to one of you." He huffed through his nose, thinking of a better approach to the officers to ease their anger. "Look, I'm not a cop. I'm no hero. I'm a schoolteacher. But if one of my kids went missing on a field trip...that would look really bad on me." He feined a saddened look, hoping his plan of gaining some sympathy was working.
"What are you getting at?" Franklin's tone was sharp.
"Yeah, Phil, what are you getting at?" Stu looked at him in confusion.
"No one wants to look bad. We gotta get to a wedding, her twin brother's wedding." Phil gestured to Olivia beside him, "And you don't need people talking about how some obnoxious tourists borrowed your squad car last night. Look, the point is, I think we can work out a deal. Discreetly of course, ma'am. What do you say?"
The two officers stayed silent, sharing glances at each other making Olivia shocked that Phil's idea had worked. Officer Garden slid over the clipboard, tapping at a section of the paper the four opposite had no clue about.
Officer Franklin laughed, directing his attention to the three men. "Let me ask you a question: Do any of you gentlemen have a heart condition or anything like that?"
"Okay, kids, you're in for a real treat today." Franklin announced, gleaming with excitement. The group were taken to a room that was now filled with a sea of kids that were on the field trip, sat in rows facing the front with Olivia stood at the back, now observing what the officer's had in store for the other three, the woman not included for a reason they didn't know.
"These gentlemen have kindly volunteered to demonstrate how a stun gun is used to subdue a suspect." Liv's eyes widened at his words while the kids all made a sound of interest, Stu and Phil furrowing their brows — gaze towards officer Franklin in protest.
"Now, there's two ways to use a stun gun. Up close and personal." The officer stuck it to Stu's neck causing a scream to leave him mouth, his body collapsing to the floor.
"Oh, my God." Olivia muttered to herself while the kids around her laughed.
Phil stumbled back in shock, watching his friend twitch on the floor. "What the fuck?" He uttered.
"Or you can shoot it from a distance. Now, do I have any volunteers? You wanna come up here and do some shooting? Huh?" Arms were immediately launching in the air, all eager to have a go at using the object. "Alright, how about you, young lady? Come on up here. Alright."
"Let's go, handsome, come on." Franklin coaxed Phil forward only for Alan to move instead. "Not you, fat Jesus, slide it on back. You, pretty boy. Alright, now, it's real simple. All you gotta do is point, aim and shoot."
The little girl held up the weapon in front of her and with the encouragement from the police officer, she shot and tased Phil in the crotch, causing him to groan and fall to the floor and roll around in pain.
"Good. Hey, we got one more charge left. Anybody wanna do some shooting up here?" Now that Alan was the only one left standing, every kid was eager to get their turn. Franklin coaxed a kid up, coincidentally the same kid who had taken a photo of Alan earlier that day. As the two had a stare off, everyone watched with intensity as the kid aimed the tase gun at Alan's face.
Shooting, Alan let out a yell causing the two officers to let out a cackle as his body remained unmoving. But, he started to walk toward the blonde boy in front of him, scaring the rest of the kids and to knock him out completely, Franklin set another voltage into his neck.
"Fuck those guys, you hear me?" Stu exclaimed, "That was bullshit. I'm telling everybody we stole a cop car."
"They let us go, who cares?"
"I care! You can't just do that. You can't just tase people because you think it's funny. That's police brutality."
Olivia let out a sigh in her spot out of exhaustion, brushing her hand through her hair. "We've all had a really long day, okay? It's not the end of the world, Stu."
Stu took a deep breath, keeping his temper at bay. "I'm grabbing a soda. Do you guys want anything?"
They all shook their heads at the offer, watching Stu walk off to blow off some steam. "My man doesn't shut up, Jesus Christ." Phil huffed as he was out of ear reach.
Olivia turned her head to face Phil, inspecting his facial expression as his gaze stayed onto the ground in front of him. Concerned, she brought her hand up to his cheek, grabbing his attention. Phil's eyes softened as she moved her hand to the hair on the nape of his neck, giving him a kiss on the cheek. "What was that for?" A smile grew on his face.
"Looked like you needed it." Liv breathed out a laugh, "You okay?"
"Yeah, I'm okay. Are you okay?"
"Just worried." She uttered, her smile dropping. "What if this is serious? What if something bad happened to Doug?"
"You can't think like that, hon. Get out of that head of yours, he's fine." Phil assured, bringing her hand into his in a comforting manner.
His words weren't enough for Olivia to start thinking positive as she now started to ramble with worry. "What if we don't find him though? What do we do then? Tracy will murder me and there'll be no wedding—"
She was cut off by Phil pressing his lips into hers causing the words in her throat to die as she melted into the kiss. "Shh. We'll figure it out and we'll find Doug and we'll get to go to his wedding tomorrow, trust me."
"Why'd you do that?" Liv mumbled.
Phil grinned, "Looked like you needed it." He repeated her words, "Just breathe, we just need to find out what the fuck happened last night so we can find him."
"What if he's dead?" Alan piped up. "I can't afford to lose anybody close to me again. It hurts too much. I was so upset when my grandpa died."
"How'd he die?" Liv asked.
"World War two."
"Died in battle?"
"No, he was skiing in Vermont." Alan replied, "It was just during World War two."
"Alan...Doug is fine." Phil stated.
"Well, why hasn't he called?"
"That's what we're trying to find out."
"I'll tell you another thing—" Stu came walking from around the corner, "6-1 odds our car is beat to shit."
"Stu, not now." Phil warned, not wanting to make Alan's fragile state worse.
"No, how much do you wanna bet it's fucked beyond recognition?"
"That's enough, Alan's seriously worried." Liv told him, "Let's try not to freak him out any more."
After catching his worried expression, Stu moved towards him. "Sorry, Alan. You know what? We'll search the car for clues and everything's gonna be okay."
They all heard the sound of a car approaching, the feeling of dread hitting them all at once, wondering how the car had turned out after the chaos they had endured last night. As the car came to a stop, they all sighed in relief at the sight of the car completely untouched and in the condition it was when they drove it to Vegas.
"You see? It's gonna be alright."