Robbie sighed and rubbed his eyes, this case was really starting to take it out of him. Jackie was a good friend and he'd do anything for her, whereas those kids...he shook his head. He'd never forgive himself in anything happened to any of them.

Which was shaping up to be harder to prevent than he had hoped since Michael refused (and quite rightly Robbie had to agree) to meet any of Culpepper's demands. The problem was that this required Robbie and Stuart to find him before the deadline Culpepper had given them.

Easier said than done.

He looked over to where Stuart sat, the younger man had been working almost nonstop since they had gone missing and had taken to drinking copious amounts of caffeine. Robbie wondered how he managed to function without bouncing off the walls.

"Have the uniforms turned up anything?" Robbie asked, breaking the silence and startling Stuart.

"No, nothing as yet," Stuart replied, mopping up the coffee he'd spilt in his fright.

"What about crime scene?" Robbie continued, leaning back in his chair to stretch out his tired muscles.

"Nothing," Stuart said regretfully, looking through the report again, "all they were able to do was confirm the blood on the carpet as Jackie's."

Robbie closed his eyes against the memory of the photo of Jackie that Culpepper had sent with his letter. Seeing Jackie with dried blood across her forehead had not been an experience he would not care to repeat, he could only imagine what Michael must be feeling.

Robbie glanced at the pictures that Nerys and Katrina had made for him when he and Stuart had minded them when Ebony was born. Whatever it took he was determined to find them.

He jumped when the phone rang; shaking his head at his reaction he picked up the phone. He wasn't surprised to find Michael on the other end, what did surprise him was the excitement in the other man's tone.

"He what?" Robbie exclaimed, causing Stuart to look up in confusion, "How on earth did he manage to do that when we had no success? That's almost embarrassing," Robbie continued. He listened for a moment before nodding, "Don't you worry, we'll be right over with more back up than you can poke a stick at," Robbie assured him.

As he hung up Robbie looked at Stuart with a grin, "It would seem that our old friend Nelson has succeeded where the sniffer dogs failed," he told him, "Nelson managed to sniff them out."

Stuart grinned as well, "You're right, that almost is embarrassing," he said as he grabbed him coat and followed Robbie out of the room.