He eyed Sarah's cup of milk. "You have to finish."

Sarah looked at him, then back at her cup. She had only finished half so far and she really didn't want more. "Ugly."

Kevin chuckled. "Milk it's good for you, and it's not that bad."

But Sarah nodded and Kevin smiled. All right, so maybe it was that bad, but that didn't mean she didn't have to drink it.

"I know you like chocolate milk better, but you can't have it every day?"

"Why not?"

"Right," Nick said with a smile and a tilt of his head, "why not?"

Kevin gave him a severe look. I don't need your help, he said with green eyes. You should back me up in this.

But Nick didn't want to back Kevin up. He had been denied of chocolate milk all through his teens. He was gonna back Sarah up on this one.

"It's too much sugar for so early in the morning."

"No, it's not."

Kevin glared at Nick. "You're not helping," he hissed.

Nick was about to answer back just as Alex rolled his eyes at the slightly argument when he was interrupted by Allison walking into the room.

"I've got it," she declared with a smile on her face. "I've got it."

Kevin's face turned serious for a moment. He got the magazine from Allison's hand, the cover a picture of the boys standing before a clear background.

He started flipping through the pages, barely registering that the rest of the boys were doing the same, and scanned the interview.

The questions Janet had made the boys, the answers, and then his eyes stopped on the change of subject.

We had almost been done with the interview when something surprised me. A little girl, not more than four, entered the room and walked over to Kevin. I sat there, wide eyed, as she climbed onto his lap and was held tightly and lovingly.

"She's my daughter," Kevin Richardson, 30, told me and I could only stare at him.

Kevin let out a soft sigh as he read the words.

He explained it to me while my eyes were glued to the girl. A dear old friend of Kevin, a friend from back school, died a couple of weeks ago from Cancer. The same disease took Kevin's father when he was only nineteen. On its wake, the girl was left alone, the mother's parents having died years ago.

Upon decision of both the mother and Kevin himself, and even though Kevin's isn't the biological father, the girl was left on Kevin's care.

"I'm happy with my decision," Kevin told me after finishing his tale. "I love her with all my heart."

He had been a big influence on the girl's life since her birth, and it seemed only natural that Kevin took her. I couldn't deny that as I looked at him holding the girl on his chest, running his fingers through the girl's dark hair.

The boys support Kevin's decision one hundred percent.

"He did what he felt was right," Brian said, proud of his cousin. "We're happy for him."

Sarah of only four years old looked at me through the rest of the interview, seizing me quietly. But she didn't need to say anything, because her big green eyes expressed enough in her silence. She couldn't be happier than being in Kevin's arms.

Little Sarah is staying with Kevin during the tour, and the boys seem to enjoy every minute. For them, it looks more like having a little sister visiting. Nick can relate, having three younger sisters.

"We all baby-sit," added Howie while looking at Sarah. "And she's a sweetheart."

Changes have been made to accommodate the girl. AJ McLean, the Bad Boy of the group, doesn't smoke when the girl it's around. "Group's policy," he told me, and I understood them. They don't raise their voices and talk to her with warmth.

I feel Sarah couldn't have found a better 'family' to be with. And I'm sure Kevin will be a great father. His action say nothing but such as you look at her, kissing Sarah's head and giving the little girl a small smile.

No pictures of Sarah are available because of Kevin's refusal of the child to be photograph.

"I don't want her in this environment," he said with a small shrug. "She's too young. I want her to be a child, just a little girl. Maybe later, when she's older."

One can only understand his reasons.

I can say she's one lucky girl, being in the Backstreet Family. She may not have the Richardson name, and Kevin might not be her biological father, but he sure looks like such. All through and through, she's Kevin's daughter and is treated like it. We can now say that the first "Backstreet Baby" has arrived and it's named Sarah with only four years old.

Kevin smiled softly as the article ended. It was exactly what he had expected of Janet.

"Now, that was accuracy."

Kevin looked up to Brian, a matching grin on his cousin's face. "Yep."

"I knew I liked that girl for a reason."

Nick rolled his eyes at Alex's response. "Yep, that and because she has a skirt."

"Now, Nick," Howie said as he rolled the magazine that was in his hands, "Alex also fancies women in pants."

"Hey!"

Allison shook her head at the boys' antics. They were like children. Her eyes moved to Sarah, sitting by Kevin's side and looking at her cup of milk with a thoughtful expression on her face. It was as if that cup was more interesting than the events that had just occurred in the media, in the business and, in a matter of minutes, all across the nation.

Oh, yeah, right now, the only mature ones were Kevin, Sarah and herself.

Allison smiled despite herself. Sarah was certainly her father's daughter. She frowned. Well, sort of.

"I guess that puts an end on the worrying, right?"

Kevin nodded with a relaxed face and Allison was happy the older man wasn't fretting over such an item.

"How long do you think it takes for Mark to call?"

Alex snorted at Howie's question. "Quite sometime. I'm sure he's having a stroke at the moment."

Nick laughed, even though the comment was rather mean hearted.

"I liked the way she wrote it. It was like "The album is amazing and the tour it's really stunning. Oh, by the way, Kevin has a daughter now. I loved it," Alex finished with a grin.

"I'm glad you liked it," Allison said with a small smile. She had been wondering, as she walked from her room over to Kevin's, if maybe she'd be, once again, the bearing of bad news. It had been entirely the opposite, and she couldn't be happier.

"I'll leave you all now." She turned around and made her way out of the room, decided to read the whole interview in the comfort of her room.

"I don't want it." Sarah said with a frown, her eyes fixed on the milk before looking up at Kevin.

Kevin smiled at her, her words bringing him out of his own thoughts and into the ordinariness of the moment, the domestic side of the words, and it felt home for him.

He paused for a moment and thought about it. "How about some cookies with it?" Kevin said with a small smile.

Sarah's face seemed to lighten up in that second.

Kevin smiled at her and picked up the batch of cookies he had asked for her. He got one up from the small tea plate and handed it to her.

"You should dunk it into the milk," Nick said with a knowing smile. "They are sooooo good."

Sarah followed Nick's suggestion just as Kevin rolled his eyes.

Reviewing their schedule mentally, Kevin tried to find a couple of free hours. Tomorrow, right after breakfast. Perfect.

He tilted his head and looked at Sarah as she drunk milk with cookie crumbs. "What do you say if we go shopping tomorrow?"

Sarah nodded, even though she wasn't sure what Kevin had said. Usually it was her mommy who bought all her clothes. She had lots of pretty dresses back home.

Nick's eyes, however, lit up at the thought. "We're going shopping?"

Kevin wanted to correct the blond, that it was actually Sarah and him who were going shopping, but he thought that the boys joining them wasn't such a bad idea. "Sure, if you wanna go?"

"I've got tons of things to buy," Alex added as an after thought. "I remember seeing a dark green pair of pants that just had my name over it."

"I gotta get Sarah some things, but we can meet afterwards."

Alex pondered about it. "Nah, I can do that other time. We'll go with you."

Kevin smiled, and then Sarah asked him why did the crumbs stayed over the milk and Kevin himself wondered about that.

*****

He had known that, during the interview that followed breakfast, he'd be asked about Sarah. He had just hope they'd leave the subject alone after twenty questions. Now that he thought about it, he wondered if the woman had asked so much about the tour itself.

"Is she your biological daughter?" The woman had asked, at least, four times.

Can't you read? Kevin had been tempted to tell her. He shook his head each and every one of them. "She was a friend's daughter. I'm in charge of her now."

"But is she yours?"

"She's mine now, if that's what you asking."

"Does she have your name?"

"She has her mother's name."

"Which is?"

Kevin had given her a tight smile and shake of his head. "That's private."

It really hadn't been that bad. If she had been more aggressive, he would be sporting bruises at the moment.

Mark called during lunch, just like Kevin had thought he would.

"You should have told us first," he told Kevin, while the older man just smiled over at a puzzled Sarah. "You should have told you were gonna let it out."

Planning on giving the man a piece of his mind, Kevin had smiled at Sarah, kissed her on top of her head and gone to his room to yell properly.

"Of course I was gonna tell the media, or did you actually thought I was gonna keep Sarah a secret forever?"

The bastard hadn't even answer.

"Look, she's mine, all right, so deal with it. She's mine and she's staying with us, she's staying with me for as long as the tour last. I'm not going to hide her, so you better get that. Now, if you don't mind, I need to get back to the table." And with that, Kevin hung up.

The boys had cheered and Sarah had smiled to him, and the sole idea of going shopping with her the next day, had been enough.

After sound check in the venue, Kevin walked into the dressing room with Sarah on his arm. He placed her on the couch and he tilted his head. She was all quiet and tranquil. Maybe it shouldn't worry him, but it did.

"What is it darling? Something wrong?"

She seemed to think his words through, trying to see if she should answer it.

"What ever it is, you can tell me, you know?"

After a moment, she nodded. "Can I play with the cape?"

Kevin thought for a second. The cape?

It took a moment for Kevin's mind to catch up with Sarah's quick one, and he smiled at her. She was referring to the black overcoat Kevin used for "Everybody".

Placing a small kiss on her head, Kevin smiled at her. "Of course you can, sweetie."

He walked towards the closet, opened the wide doors and peered inside. He picked the coat in question, and turned to give it to Sarah.

"Just be careful with it honey. I only have two."

Sarah nodded, jumping off the couch and running around, the coat over her shoulders, very much like a cape. When he reached Alex, she tilted her head and looked at Alex's head. "Can I have that?"

"What do you say Sarah?"

Sarah turned around, gave Kevin a toothy smiled and glanced back at Alex. "Can I have it, please?"

Brown eyes softened and undid the small knot on the bandana around his head. Like he could ever say no to this little girl. He handed Sarah the piece of cloth and she grinned even wider. Alex's heart softened at his reward.

"Thanks," she said, then turned around and kept running around the room, under Kevin's watchful eye.

A meet-&-greet had been set up before the concert and Kevin had to leave Sarah under Josh's care because Allyson wasn't at the venue at the moment.

It had been expected that the girls would ask about Sarah.

"Is it true Kevin has a daughter?"

Brian had a smiled at the girl, finishing signing the picture and nodded. "Yes."

"Is she his?"

Looking at the old picture, Nick grimaced as he shook his head. "No, it's a friend's daughter."

"Is she here?"

Alex winked at her. "Nope, she's not here."

"Can we see her?"

Howie bit back the instinct of rolling his eyes. "No, I don't think so."

But the questions fired at Kevin were the worst.

"Why is she with you?"

Kevin signed the picture and handed it back as quick as he could. "Because it was the best for her."

The line moved and another question came with that. "Why isn't she here?"

"She's resting right now."

After thirty minutes of that, Kevin was having one killer headache, which seemed to ease when he heard Sarah's laughter coming from down the hall as she was being thrown into the air by Josh. She giggled louder and louder each time he pulled her up, and the big man was grinning just as happy.

Kevin turned around and gave Nick a pointed look. "Go on, yell at him."

The blond rolled his eyes.

"What? You mean to tell me you think I can drop her but he can't?"

"He's a lot bigger than you, Kev."

"What the hell is that suppose to mean?"

Nick chuckled at the question as he went over to Josh and took Sarah from him. He started tickling her and she squirmed in his arms, wanting to be put down. With one last move of his hand and a loud giggled from Sarah's lips, he complied.

Sarah ran to Kevin's arms and he picked her up in a second.

"I touched the sky! I touched the sky!"

Kevin smiled at her. "Oh really?"

She nodded enthusiastically. "Yes, yes, yes. 'osh made me touch the sky."

He looked at the bodyguard and Josh gave him a lopsided smiled as he shrugged.

"I picked her up," he said, "put her on my shoulders and she touched the ceiling of the hallway."

Kevin kissed the top of Sarah's head, his eyes looking up. The ceiling was painted clear blue, therefore Sarah thought it wasn't the sky.

"That's very good Sarah," he told his little girl, "but it wasn't the sky."

Sarah pouted. "It wasn't."

"No, see?" Kevin pointed towards the ceiling of the hallway they were in. "It's very clear and pretty, but it isn't the sky. That's the top of the hallway. It's called a ceiling."

"Why?"

There was a snort and a chuckle from behind and Kevin turned to look at Brian.

"I wanna see you answering that," his younger cousin told him with a smile on his lips.

Kevin glared at him, then turned back to look at Sarah. "Well..." Kevin tried to find a truthful answer, and easy to understand at the same time. He didn't want to lie to her.

"Well..." he tilted his head. "Well, you see, your name is Sarah, right?"

Sarah nodded with a happy smile.

"You have a name, and it needed a name too. So some very old people decided the name 'ceiling' was a good name."

"Does it like its name?"

Kevin nodded at her. "Yes, the ceiling likes its name."

"It's a pretty name. 'eiling."

"Ceiling," Kevin said, making emphasis on the C.

Sarah paused, then repeated. "Ceiling?"

"Yes, ceiling."

"Good one Kev," Nick told Kevin as he patted Kevin's shoulder. "You're gonna have to come up with tons more of those."

Kevin smiled at the blond, looking forward to Sarah's questions.

*****

Sarah looked at her reflection on the mirror, her face tilted. She was on a chair that Kevin had brought because she was too little to reach the faucet all on her own.

Her eyes drifted down to her toothbrush on her hand and smiled. Her mommy had taught her how to brush her teeth, but Kevin was trying to do it anyways.

"All right, once again then." Kevin smiled at her, standing behind her, looking at Sarah on the mirror reflection. "Do your right, then do your left. Then go up and do your right, and then move to your left." He grinned at her. "Good, now your tongue."

"Ah!" She said as she stuck her tongue, squinted her eyes and brushed her pink tongue.

"Good," Kevin said, gave her a kiss on top of her head, and picked her up from her waist and placed her down on the floor. He took the brush from her hands and looked at it. He definitely needed to get her a good brush, a child's brush, not thing impromptu one.

He washed it, then placed it along in his zip bag for his personal items and zip it up.

"You're gonna need another one, you know?"

Kevin nodded at Nick's words. He had to remember to get another one for Sarah. Maybe pink, or a pastel color.

"Yep. I've got a million things to buy."

Nick grinned at the words. "And that's what makes shopping so much fun."

Kevin nodded and turned around just in time to see Sarah running towards their bunk and jumping onto the bed. He smiled at the sight as he walked over there and placed the bag in one of his suitcases.

Clad already in her nightgown, she pushed the covers down, disarranging them in the process, and climbed into bed. She snuggled into the soft pillow, and looked over at Kevin.

The older man smiled, and was about to follow her into the bed when she spoke. "Read me story?" She asked with an almost sleepy smile.

Caught of guard, Kevin tilted his head. "A story?"

"Yeah, a bedtime story." Green eyes danced with expectation and Kevin swallowed thickly.

Kevin blinked, his eyes focusing slowly on Sarah's green eyes instead of Lizzie's blue ones. He didn't remember Lizzie's favorite story.

"A story?" Kevin repeated, shifting his weight as he sat on the bed, and he leaned over, placing his elbow on the pillow. He looked at Sarah and smiled. "Let me see if I remember one."

"'night Kevin. Good night Sarah," Alex said as he left the bathroom and climbed into his own bunk, the one above Kevin's.

"'night Alex." He turned around once again, looked at Sarah and felt a presence on his left.

"Do you even remember bedtime stories?"

Kevin rolled his eyes at the question. "Yes, I do," Kevin said sardonically.

Nick shrugged nonchalantly. "I'm just saying."

"Go to bed Nick."

"Sure." Nick placed his hand on Kevin's shoulder for balanced and leaned over to give Sarah a small kiss on her forehead. "Sweet dreams Sarah."

"Good night," Sarah said softly, her eyes dazzling as she turned over to Kevin once again.

"Bye Kev."

"Bye Nick." Kevin sighed softly and tried to remember a story. "Okay... let see. There was a princess--"

"What was her name?"

He smiled. "Sarah. There was this princess named Sarah--"

"Where did she live?"

"In a castle, of course."

"Do all princesses live in castles?"

"Yes, but--"

"And where are all this castles?"

"These," Kevin corrected with a smile. "Well, there are a couple in Scotland--"

"Where's Scotland?"

"In Europe."

"And where's Europe?"

"On the other side of the world."

"Can we go?"

Kevin thought about it for a moment. "Someday, yeah."

Sarah's eyes lit up. "Really?"

"Yes."

"And I can go to the castle?"

"Yes."

"Will that make a princess?"

Kevin heard a chuckle from the bed above of his. He frowned, closed his hand into a fist and hit his ceiling, the other bed's base, three times. The chuckling stop.

"No, you have to be the daughter of a Queen to be--"

"What's a Queen?"

"The Princess' mother."

"Isn't the princess' mother an evil witch?"

Kevin chuckled. "Sometimes, but--"

"Because I remember that from one story."

"Yes, but--"

"And does the princess has brothers and sisters?"

"Well, it depends--"

"What does depends mean?"

Kevin let out a soft sight. So maybe his patience wasn't as much as he had thought. "It means that sometimes it happens and sometimes they don't."

"Oh."

She paused and Kevin found that to be his cue to continue the story. "Well, there was this princess that lived in a castle and she had her father, the King--"

"What's a king?"

"The princess' father."

"Does he have a name?"

This time, the chuckles came from the bunk across from his. "Yes," Kevin said with a smile even though he planned on giving Nick a piece of his mind the next morning, "his name was..." He grinned. "Nick?"

"Huh?"

It was Kevin who chuckled this time at Nick's surprised words. So the blond was listening to his story, as were the other boys for sure; well, he'll show them.

"King Nick--"

"Does he live in the castle too?"

"Yes."

"Why?"

"Because the princess needs her father."

"Oh."

"Okay, so King Nick was a good king, but kinda of a dork sometimes--"

"Hey!"

Sarah chuckled, and Kevin followed her, even though he wasn't sure she was chuckling ought to the story or the blonde's complains.

"Well, the King was a dork but his daughter was very beautiful," Kevin said with a smile, caressing his nose with his fingers and Sarah scrunched up her little nose cutely. "This king--"

"Is there a witch on the story?"

Kevin thought about it. "Well, maybe."

"Is she going to be mean to the pricess?"

"With the princess, and I'm not so sure--"

"Because it's bad to be mean, right?"

Kevin nodded. "Yeah, it's very bad."

"Then the witch can't be mean."

"Shouldn't, but, yeah, she shouldn't."

"The king will protect her?"

"Yes, the king--"

"Does he know the witch?"

Kevin sighed softly and closed his eyes for a moment. "Sarah," he said, opening his eyes. "It's really late, completely pass your bedtime and you really have to sleep. What do you say if we leave the story for tomorrow?"

Sarah thought about it, and then nodded.

"Great," Kevin said, letting out a soft sigh of relieve.

There were applauses from the rest of the bunks, cheers from the boys, and Kevin was going to make sure to spike each and every one of their coffees the next morning.

He kissed Sarah, who scooted over, and climbed into the bed. He turned off the small light from the corner of the bunk and closed the curtain.

There were still some chuckles coming from the boys, and that made Sarah laugh.

"Shut up already, will ya?" Kevin yelled across the room, a frown on his face.

That only erupted more laughter and Kevin rolled his eyes. In a couple of minutes, the boys settled down, even though Kevin was sure the last one to do so was Nick, and snuggled closer to Sarah.

She placed her head on his shoulder, let out a soft sigh and was out like a light in two minutes time.