This story takes place in the future. It will be Lante centric with some Michael/Abby, as well. The only real back story that won't be explained is that Brenda's child is not still alive. Everything else should be covered. Please read and review – this is my first story in awhile and I want to know if it's worth keeping up with it.
November 2011
Lulu's POV
The smell of French toast crashed into me as the shrill cry of my alarm clock startled me out of my sleep. Without opening my eyes, I slapped my hand to my left, searching for the snooze button. It was a very important day – a day that I could not oversleep. But I felt like I had not slept in weeks, and Dante's bed was far too comfortable to vacate so quickly.
"Hey sleepy head," his voice called from the kitchen, "You're missing that alarm clock by about two feet, and if you're not careful, you're going to break the frame around that gorgeous picture of my girlfriend."
"A little help here?" I whined, still refusing to open my eyes and turn off the alarm clock. "I feel like my head is going to explode."
I heard him set down some silverware on the table before his footsteps moved toward me. The bed sunk as he sat next to me, and soon his lips brushed against my forehead as the high pitched shriek of my alarm clock was cut off.
"Still no fever," he whispered, running his fingers through my hair. "But maybe you should call Maxie and let her know you need an extra hour to swing by the hospital and get checked out."
"Something tells me that Maxie isn't going to take that so well on the biggest day of her career," I groaned, forcing my eyes open to meet his gaze. "Besides, there's no need to go to the hospital. I'm just fighting off a bug."
"It's actually kicking your ass," he corrected, "Two weeks isn't just fighting off a bug."
I sat up, masking the dizziness that overcame me. "Either way, it can at least wait until tomorrow. We are leaving for Manhattan in four hours. There's still a lot to take care of, mainly calming Maxie down. Today is…"
"The defining point in her new career as an editor for Crimson… trust me, she's informed everyone."
"Exactly, and I would be the world's worst first assistant if I bailed on her," I groaned, finally starting to feel balanced. "Plus Abby just started last week. I don't think it's fair for me to make her go in and handle the hell that will be Maxie's nerves."
I threw in a small pout to convince him. Sure, what I was saying about Maxie, Abby and work was all legitimate. But even more important was the fact that I hated going to see doctors. I had managed to create a system where my one year checkups always got stretched to eighteen months, a feat I was damned proud to own.
"If you're not feeling better tomorrow morning, I'm driving you there first thing," he started, running the pads of his fingers along my palm. He knew he had me with that gesture.
"Fine," I agreed, leaning forward and giving him a soft kiss to symbolize the end of our negotiation.
"I wasn't done with my stipulations," he whispered against my lips. "You are going to eat breakfast this morning before you leave."
"I don't know if I'll have ti-"
"Lu," he asserted firmly. "Not up for negotiation. I told Michael and Abby to stop by, too. You can spare twenty minutes to eat, especially since we both know that you won't be doing much more of it today. Don't make me negotiate harder. Just get in the shower and I'll finish cooking."
Twenty five minutes later, I came out of the bathroom ready to go. I was grateful that we would be spending the majority of the day traveling and doing grunt work, so I was able to bypass putting on makeup and pull my hair into a loose ponytail for the time being. As much as I would didn't want to admit it to Dante, I still felt awful.
"Thank God for sweatpants," Abby remarked about my attire when I got to the kitchen table. I was relieved to see that she had followed my line of thinking, "I only wish that these would be appropriate for the gala tonight."
"Who says they can't be when you wear them so well?" Michael flirted, leaning in to kiss his girlfriend.
I sat down at the table and grinned. It was so great to see Michael finally being lighthearted. He and Abby had a rocky start, but they were so grounded with one another that it made all of the adversity they went through seem irrelevant. Michael's parole was about to be lifted in two months, so when he started to want Abby to stay over, Dante suggested he rent the apartment across the hall. It was a great situation, and Michael made a much better neighbor than that apartment's previous tenant.
"Okay, food's done," Dante cleared his throat, snaking his arm between Michael and Abby to set a plate of French toast on the table – a gesture that was not lost on Michael.
"Don't mind my brother," he instructed Abby, "He just gets uptight when he's not the one making out at the table."
"Excuse me, but my ma made a hard and fast rule that when the food is at the table, the only things touching your lips should be silverware and the food," Dante quipped.
"We'll tone it down," Abby smirked, taking some food and putting it on her plate. "Thanks for breakfast, Dante. This will probably be the only chance we get to sit down and eat all day."
"So you're telling me that Dante and I are driving all the way to Manhattan to sit at the Crimson table and eat without our dates?" Michael questioned, also digging into the food and passing the plate along to me. I felt queasy just looking at the decadent slices of toast in front of me, but knew that Dante was in full-blown protective mode. If I didn't force down some food, he would never let me avoid the doctor for one more day.
"No, we'll be sitting with you, but I doubt I'll be able to relax enough to eat. I definitely picked the wrong few weeks to start working for Maxie. The poor woman is balancing a new job and a new engagement. No wonder she's so demanding."
"That's just Maxie," Dante explained, taking a seat next to me. I noticed him eyeing my plate closely, as if he was ready to declare at any moment that I was too sick to work. "Be grateful she has a fiancé to go home to every night. Connie was never as low maintenance after hours as Maxie has been. I have actually spent three nights in a row without competing with the phone for Lulu's full attention."
I was just about to force the second bite of breakfast into my mouth when said phone started buzzing. Grateful for the distraction from eating, I got up from my seat and grabbed my purse from the coffee table. Abby's phone hummed seconds after mine. It was obviously Maxie.
"Mornings, however, are a totally different story," Dante sighed from behind me.
I looked at the text message from my boss and best friend and swore under my breath. If Maxie was already pissed off, the day would inevitably drag on slowly.
911 – my dress is not in yet. Need you both to go on ahead and work with the venue to make sure it looks amazing, but not extravagant. Will call when my incompetent seamstress fixes this.
Dante's POV
"What's going on?" I asked. I got up and wrapped my arms around her waist from behind her, looking down at the text message on her phone.
"Maxie's dress isn't ready," she answered, shoving her phone back into her purse and digging around for something. I felt her body melt into mine just enough to know that she was using all of her will power to ignore whatever illness was still in her system. "She wants us to go to Manhattan now to set up and make sure everything looks good."
"I thought the train wasn't leaving until 10," Michael remarked. "Do you need me to call Dad and send a driver over to bring you to Manhattan?"
"I'll just drive," Lulu answered, frustrated about whatever she wasn't finding in her large bag. I reached forward and helped her, pulling her keys out from under makeup, power bars and jewelry.
"That actually works out great," I remarked, shooting a knowing glance at Michael. "We can take a train later, and then the four of us can drive back together after the event."
Lulu and Abby had no idea, but my brother and I had booked rooms in the city for the night. As soon as Maxie announced the location of the Crimson charity gala back in August, I knew that it would be the perfect opportunity to get Lulu to New York City without any work interference. I had played the whole thing – the beautiful hotel suite that we would stay in after the work was done, the limo that would bring us from a picnic lunch in Central Park to a private tour of Yankee Stadium and the moonlight carriage ride that would lead us to Rockefeller Center, where I would ask Lulu to be my wife. Michael agreed to stay in the city with Abby and join us for the celebration after what I prayed would be an acceptance to my proposal. What I hadn't planned on was Lulu getting sick. But after the stress that came along with the event was over, I hoped that she would rebound. And if she didn't, I would save the proposal for once she felt better.
Lulu turned around in my arms and kissed me softly. "Thank you for understanding."
"Of course," I reassured her.
Two hours after Lulu and Abby had left for Manhattan, I sat at my desk staring at the empty tray that typically held my case files. In all of my years on the police force, I had never been without a case to work on. Sure, it was better for the community as a whole that things were calm in Port Charles, but after my first years in town dealing with the Lopez brothers, Franco, the Balkan and even my father, a quiet week just felt bizarre.
"Take your pick," Ronnie called, setting two file folders on my desk. "You can have the ninth grader who claims her best friend stole her cell phone and her boyfriend or the woman who has called fourteen times because her neighbor's kids are too loud."
"Wow, are you sure I'm up for this kind of detective work?" I asked sarcastically, looking up and noticing my father and Michael walking in together. "What are you doing here?"
"We need to talk," Sonny asserted, staring Ronnie down, "in private."
I glanced at my brother's face for some indication of what was going on, but he looked as unsure as I felt. I stood up and led them into the interrogation room. Ever since Brenda was found and the Balkan left town, Sonny and I had been on decent terms. It was important for my brothers and sister to know that I was trying to make my relationship work with Sonny. His business had not given me much reason to investigate him lately, so although we were far from Sunday dinners at his house, we were able to interact peacefully.
Sonny closed the door behind him and looked at us slowly. I could tell something was wrong, and I immediately worried for my sister who was away at school. Michael's brain must have gone to the same place, because he put that same concern into words.
"What's going on? Is Kristina alright?"
"Yeah, yeah, your sister is fine," Sonny answered, "I just talked to her guards at Yale."
"And Morgan?"
"Morgan is safe, too," he responded, pulling an envelope out of his pocket and pushing it towards me. I grabbed it and examined the typed address on the front. It had his name on it, but no address. "I got this last night. It was waiting for me on the doorstep. Go ahead – open it."
I removed the contents from the envelope and realized they were photos. The first was one of Sonny and Brenda's wedding pictures. It was the same family portrait that Brenda had framed above the fireplace in their dining room, depicting Sonny, Brenda, my siblings and me. Brenda had given each of us our own individual copies in frames, as well, for our birthdays.
"What is it, Dante?" Michael asked. I flipped that photo over and noticed the back was blank, then handed it to Michael, uncovering the second photo. It was a black and white shot of Michael and Abby kissing outside of Jake's. It looked like a surveillance photo – something that Michael and Abby probably didn't know had ever been taken. I flipped through the next photos, each getting a little more disturbing. There were photos of them in Michael's apartment, the MetroCourt and Abby's place, all showing them having sex. I went through them quickly, uncomfortable with what I was seeing.
"I don't get it. What's the big deal about somebody sending Dad wedding pictures?"
"They're not just wedding pictures," Sonny answered, speaking when I couldn't find words. I had gotten to the second half of the pile, where the subjects went from Michael and Abby to Lulu and me. My heart accelerated as I paged through what could only be described as our most intimate moments on film. All of the pictures were blank on the backside except for the last one.
It was taken on a camping trip we had been on in September. How anybody could have gotten that view inside of our tent baffled me, but the writing on the back was what grabbed my attention.
"Your wife deprived me of ever having a grandchild. I feel inclined to return the favor…" I read aloud.
Michael reached forward and pulled the pictures from my hands. His face turned bright red as he looked through them. The rage that he had become so good at hiding away was resurfacing.
"What kind of sick bastard does this!" he screamed, crumpling the photos into a ball and hurling them across the room.
"Theo Hoffman," Sonny sighed, rubbing his eyes in frustration. "I've already put more guards on your sister, but this threat is pretty targeted. I want you both to take Lulu and Abby to the island. My jet is already waiting for you."
Without saying a word, Michael looked at me and I could tell he was thinking the same thing. My hand reached for my pocket and instinctively dialed Lulu's phone number. Seconds seemed like hours as the phone rang over and over again, then went to voicemail. Michael had the same experience calling Abby.
"Damn it!" Michael swore, frantically pressing the end button on his phone and trying again. I choked back the fear I was feeling, trying to convince myself that they were driving with the radio on loud and didn't hear their phones. That had to be it – there was no way that anything could have happened in two hours. The problem with being a cop, though, was that I knew better.