"How can he be gone?!" screamed Cordelia as she sobbed against Angel's chest, for good measure she battered him with her fists too. "How?!"

Angel winced as his super powerful vampire hearing was shot to pieces by Cordelia's apparently super powerful screaming. "I don't know," he managed to choke out, "one moment he was there and then I looked back and he was gone! Without a sound I might add."

"Ohhhh! He's dead isn't he, they're going to send us little pieces of him in boxes."

"Cordy, calm down, we don't know anything right now."

She hiccupped and glared at him, managing to look imposing even with a blotchy face and runny nose.

"But he has vanished, that in itself cannot be a good sign Angel, even you must admit that." Wesley added. Then as he saw Cordelia's face crumple and her mouth suck in more air he hastily scrambled to amend his statement, "Though of course it is highly possible that whatever took him, if indeed he was taken does not mean him any harm, In fact I'm quite sure he'll er, turn up sooner or later." He scurried for the safety of the office library, calling over his shoulder, "In fact, I think I should be researching this right now."

Angel gave Cordelia a gentle shake, "Actually, Wes is right Cordy; I think he may have been trying to squirm away from your screeching but essentially he was right. Although Doyle's disappearance isn't a good thing it could still be nothing and we shouldn't panic until we know more."

At this Cordelia seemed to calm down very slightly before her eyes flew wide with horror, "But Angel! Doyle's sister arrives tomorrow morning! What the hell do we tell her? Maybe 'Hey! We're your brother's friends, but he's not around right now because Angel mislaid him in a sewer and something nasty has probably eaten him by now!' this is awful!" she sobbed, hurrying away up the stairs.

Angel stood like a statue in the foyer of the Hyperion for a good five minutes after that pronouncement. He had completely forgotten about Buffy and her planned arrival in their lives. What the hell could he tell her? He collapsed behind the reception desk to consider his options.

His first impulse was to call her and say that she couldn't possibly come to stay because he'd had to send Doyle away on an urgent case but then he realized he didn't have her phone number and besides her mom was already away and she was already in LA with her dad for a night or two before coming to stay at the Hyperion when he jetted off to Spain.

Even if he could find her to ask her not to come she wouldn't have anywhere else to go and he couldn't pack the kid off home to Sunnydale by herself. What was she anyway? Fourteen? Maybe fifteen? Much too young to be left alone for months anyway he decided firmly.

Eventually after another ten minutes brooding he decided to let her stay and tell her Doyle was working deep cover in a very unpleasant case that would take a few weeks. He forced himself to consider the unthinkable, and decided that if Doyle didn't come back by then, then he would have to tell her he'd vanished on the case and could realistically be dead. Satisfied with his decision he went to join Wesley with the books, if his friend were still alive he would research and hunt and kill until he found him.