Author's Note: Sequel to "A Gentleman's Guide to Suits, Ties, and White Collars", but can easily be read as a standalone. Set four months after the conclusion of that fic.
The jangling of generic salsa music from inside his pocket caused Mike to jolt upright, sending Harvey's copy of Jurisprudence, Text, and Readings on the Philosophy of Law tumbling onto the floor.
"Harvey?" Mike asked hopefully as he flicked open the phone, completely forgetting he had promised himself he was going to give his boss the silent treatment for staying out all night and making him worry.
"Try again," came a smooth female voice on the other end. There was a pause, then she said, "Wait, Harvey's not with you?"
"No," Mike said, an uneasy feeling settling in the pit of his stomach, "I haven't seen him since last night. He never came home. I must have fallen asleep waiting for him and - oh my God, is that the time?" Mike looked down at his watch and saw to his horror that it was already past eight.
"Good thing Harvey's not here to see you slipping," Donna observed, though an undercurrent of worry belied her normally flippant tone.
"I'll be there in twenty," Mike said quickly, hanging up the phone after uttering a rushed goodbye.
He catapulted himself out of the chair and up the stairs to the master bedroom, allowing himself to hope for just a moment that Harvey had simply gotten drunk, come in after Mike had nodded off in the chair, and was currently passed out on his silk sheets.
This faint hope turned into a nonexistent one when he reached the bedroom and found it in the exact state Harvey had left it when he'd departed the apartment at ten o'clock the night before, promising to be home in a couple hours.
Mike let out a sigh as he felt his stomach churn more violently than before. In desperation, he flipped open the phone still in his hand and held down the one until his finger hurt before raising the device to his ear. He was dismayed, however, when instead of the normal cheerful ringing, he immediately heard Harvey's commanding voice saying, "Harvey Specter. You know the drill."
"God, Harvey, where are you? I waited all night for you to come back. Whatever you're doing, just call me back and let me know that you're not...that you're all right...okay?" He hung up the phone, knowing if he stayed on the line any longer he would begin to ramble and might voice aloud one of the thousand fears swirling around in his mind.
He ran his normal morning routine in a rush, growing more and more panicked as he went through each mundane task he was accustomed to doing alongside Harvey. For the first time in three months, Mike picked out a suit without Harvey rolling his eyes at it, ran a comb through his hair without Harvey hogging the mirror, and took a shower without Harvey jumping in next to him with a feeble excuse about how it would save time.
Consequently, by the time he had biked to the office, sprinted into Harvey's clearly empty office, and tried his cell phone again to no avail, Mike was in full-blown panic mode.
"Please God, tell me he's called you," he said anxiously, rushing over to Donna's desk.
"Calm down, Mike," she said soothingly, laying a hand on his arm. "I'm sure he just got held up with a client outside of cell range. He'll call as soon as he gets back to the city."
"But he should have been back hours ago, Donna," Mike objected, running a hand agitatedly through his hair. He lowered his voice before continuing, "When he went out around ten last night, Harvey told me that it wouldn't take more than a couple hours."
"There are a million different things that could have delayed him," Donna reasoned, though Mike could tell she was nearly as worried as he was.
"He would have called, Donna," Mike said firmly. "Harvey may enjoy playing the heartless bastard on occasion, but he wouldn't have made us worry like this. Even if he was in the middle of the Arctic tundra, he would have found a way to let us know he was okay; you know that as well as I do."
Donna looked like she was about to deny it, but finally just nodded, her expression more serious than Mike had ever seen it before.
"What do you want to do?" she asked quietly.
"Give it to the end of the day, I suppose," Mike said reluctantly. "The police won't take a missing persons case until twenty-four hours have elapsed, anyway."
"It's a plan, then - I'll change his appointments to later in the week," Donna assented, grabbing Mike's arm as he turned to go. "Hey, why don't you work in Harvey's office today? You don't need those idiot peers of yours poking and prodding at you, and Louis will never think to look for you there. Plus, you'll be close by in case there's any word."
"Thanks, Donna," Mike said, shooting her a grateful look as he changed his destination to Harvey's office and flopped wearily on the couch; he purposefully avoided Harvey's desk, as if sitting there would have implied that Mike didn't expect him back, and he didn't want to put that notion into the universe.
As the day wore on, Mike found that despite his best efforts to focus on work, his ears pricked up at every peal of Donna's desk phone, and his head twisted hopefully toward every well-dressed man passing by Harvey's door. He found himself reading the same page of a file five times, despite having a memory that made that wholly unnecessary.
At one o'clock, Donna brought him some soup and a sandwich, accompanied by a look that made it clear not eating was not an option. By three, she had moved her base of operations into the office with him. Donna's continuous flow of questions and comments helped the day's last few hours pass more quickly than the snail's pace of the previous few, and Mike had never been more grateful for her presence.
But when the sleek, chrome clock on the desk began to blink six o'clock and there was still no word from Harvey, they both knew that no amount of small talk could fill or distract from the silent emptiness that seemed to fill the office.
Donna said nothing, but instead returned to her desk, pulled out a small envelope, and walked back in to hand it to Mike.
"Harvey gave this to me a couple months ago and said that if anything were to ever happen to him, you should follow the instructions inside."
Mike quickly accepted the proffered envelope and ripped it open, too focused to even notice that he was littering Harvey's pristine carpet with small, white pieces of paper. He pulled out a small piece of cardstock and swiftly scanned its contents before smacking it gently against his forehead and muttering, "Of course, why didn't I think of that?"
"What?" Donna asked worriedly, "What does it say?" Mike lifted the piece of paper so she could read what Harvey had written there: In case of emergency, contact Peter Burke: during office hours, (212) 384-1000, employee code 161. After six, cell phone: (212) 524-7878, address: 149 W 57th.
"You think Peter can help?" Donna asked, subconsciously rubbing her hands up and down her arms as if she were cold. "This seems a little outside his jurisdiction."
"If Harvey's in trouble, Peter will do whatever it takes to help him, jurisdiction or no," Mike said intently. "He's definitely our best shot."
He turned to leave, then paused, pivoted, and placed a hand on Donna's arm. "I'll call you if we find anything out, okay?"
She nodded, her expression now looking very worried indeed. "I can't lose him, Mike," she said quietly, raising her eyes to look into his.
Mike stepped forward to fold her into a brief hug, promising fiercely, "We won't." He had to use all his remaining energy to push down the horrible, taunting voice telling him his words might already be a lie.
"So," Neal asked, pouring himself a glass of wine, "what are we doing tonight?"
"Well, I don't know what you're doing," Peter began, picking up a large manila folder, "But I will be spending some quality time with a ring of international money launderers."
"But bond forgers are so much more fun," Neal murmured persuasively, sliding his arms over Peter's shoulders and handing him a beer.
Peter grinned and gave Neal a light peck on the lips before accepting the drink. "That is definitely true, but Hughes wants these files annotated and on his desk by tomorrow, so I'm afraid quality time with my favorite bond forger will have to wait."
"So there's nothing I can do to persuade you?"
"Not that I can think of," Peter said, preparing to flip through the formidable pile of papers in front of him.
Neal let out a disappointed sigh, shrugged, and began nonchalantly removing his shirt, one button at a time.
"Oh come on, Neal, that's hardly fair," Peter objected, though he didn't deem it strictly necessary to look away in order to make his point. "I really do have to work, so as much as I'd like to..."
"Would you stop being so full of yourself? I just wanted to do a little sculpting, that's all." Neal said casually, though his expression was distinctly mischievous. "Even a hint of clay can ruin a Forzieri shirt, you know. Or maybe you don't."
"Sculpting, huh?" asked Peter, ignoring the implied insult. "Nothing I'll recognize, I hope?"
"I don't think you'll recognize it, no," Neal replied, a gleam in his eye.
Peter had to suppress a chuckle as he said, "For the sake of our relationship, I'm going to pretend I didn't understand that," and returned his attention to his case-file.
Twenty minutes later, Peter was seriously considering going into the other room in the vain hope that being deprived of the image of Neal sculpting shirtless would result in him getting past the first paragraph of the file in his lap when there was a knock at the door.
He began to get up when Neal stopped him with a hand on his shoulder and began walking toward the door himself. "You may effectively be living here, but it's still my place, Peter," Neal admonished lightly.
"You're not decent!" Peter objected.
"I thought you liked that about me," Neal said, throwing Peter a suggestive smile over his shoulder. When Peter continued to look at him incredulously, Neal rolled his eyes, grabbed a shirt, and threw it over his shoulders, adding, "Your sense of propriety is both inconvenient and adorable."
The smile that had crept onto Neal's face immediately disappeared, however, when he opened the door and got a look at the person standing on the other side.
"Mike?" he asked, taking in the other man's rumpled clothing and haggard appearance with growing concern. "You look like hell. What happened?"
"It's Harvey," Mike said quietly, switching his panicked gaze between Neal and Peter, who had put aside his case file and risen from the couch upon hearing the worry in his partner's voice. "He's gone."