Thanks for the reviews, everyone! I appreciate everyone's interest in this story!

I don't own the character of King Benny in this chapter...I borrowed him from the movie "Sleepers".

Enjoy...

Chapter Three - Mary Angelina

New York Hospital: Pediatric Ward - 13 Hours Missing

Special Agents Malone, Taylor and Spade stepped off the elevator into the brightly decorated pediatric ward of New York Hospital and found their way to the nurses station. On their way to the desk, they looked around at all the children they passed in the hallway. Sick and pale children, children in wheelchairs, and frightened children clinging to their parents. Danny shook his head and tried not to think about it.

Flashing his badge at the middle aged nurse behind the desk, Jack said, "Good morning. I'm Special Agent Jack Malone with the F.B.I. and these are agents Taylor and Spade. We are looking for Dr. Angela Sullivan."

"Angelina." The nurse corrected him, not bothering to look up from her paperwork.

"I beg your pardon?" Jack asked, not sure if she was talking to him or not.

"Dr. Angelina Sullivan, not Angela. Mary Angelina." The nurse finally looked up at the three agents, flashed a cheerful smile, and said, "Isn't that a lovely name?" Jack, Sam and Danny all nodded as the nurse continued, "Me? I get stuck with Margie for a name, and she gets Mary Angelina. The world can be so cruel sometimes. But, a beautiful name befits a beautiful girl."

"Margie is a perfectly lovely name." Danny said with a grin.

Margie's eyes twinkled as she returned Danny's grin. "Well, aren't you the charmer?" But the twinkle left her eyes when she remembered that they were F.B.I. agents. "What do you want with Angie? Is she in trouble?" Margie asked. "That girl doesn't have the time to do anything wrong. She practically lives at this hospital."

Jack shook his head and halted her protests. "She's not in any trouble. We just want to ask her a few questions about a missing person she might know."

Margie eyed them suspiciously then looked down at her the charts she was working on. "Angie is in Room 304. Down the hall, on your right." Jack, Danny, and Sam turned and headed off in the direction she pointed and they heard Margie call out from behind them, "That girl is a God-send for these children. Don't go stirring up any trouble, you hear me?"

The door to Room 304 was open when the agents approached and they looked inside to see a beautiful, young doctor taking blood from the arm of a little girl. The girl, who couldn't be any older than seven, had bandages wrapped around her head, partially covering her golden blond curls. A woman, who the agents guessed was the girl's mother, sat in a chair nearby.

"OK, Gracie, we're almost done here. Just a little bit more." Dr. Angie Sullivan flashed a warm smile up at the little girl. "Is this your teddy bear?"

Gracie returned the doctor's warm smile and said quietly, "His name is Bob."

"Bob, hmm? That's a great name." Angie said, "I had a dog named Bob when I was little. He had big floppy ears and a white patch around his left eye. Do you have a dog?"

Gracie shook her head, "I have a cat. Mitzy."

Gracie winced as Angie removed the needle from her arm once an adequate amount of blood had been drawn. Angie swabbed Gracie's arm and secured a Barbie band-aid over the puncture wound. She reached up and smoothed out Gracie's curls with her finger tips. "You are such a brave little girl, Gracie. Thanks for talking with me."

Angie picked up the vile of blood and walked over to Gracie's mom. "I'll get this down to the lab, run some tests, and we should know a little bit more by tomorrow. Hang in there."

Angie was scribbled something on her clipboard as she walked out into the hallway, almost colliding with Jack and Danny. She looked up, startled, as Danny put his hand on her arm to steady her. "I'm sorry." She mumbled, looking around for a lab technician.

"Dr. Sullivan?" Jack asked her.

"Just one second." Angie replied, distracted by the sudden appearance of the lab tech she had been looking for. To him, she said, "Hey, Jerry. Run this down to the lab for me and ask Karen to run the tests on it for Gracie Markum. And put a rush on it. She'll know what I'm talking about." The lab tech nodded and took off down the hall. Angie turned back to Jack and said, "I'm sorry. Can I help you?"

"Are you Dr. Angelina Sullivan?" Jack asked again, this time placing the emphasis on her first name.

A tired smile spread over Angie's face as she said, "You called me Angela in front of Margie, didn't you?" Jack nodded as Angie laughed and continued, "She has this thing about my name. I don't always understand it, but she's a fabulous nurse and an even better human being."

"It's a great name." Sam said, finally joining the conversation. "Very Italian."

"So am I." Angie replied.

"Sullivan?" Sam asked, feigning ignorance about her identity. "Sounds pretty Irish to me."

"It's was my mother's maiden name."

"So then, what is your family name?" Sam asked.

Angie eyed her suspiciously and then turned to look at Danny and Jack. "What did you say your names were?"

"We didn't." Danny said, flashing his badge and stepping in front of Sam. Starting off by lying to this woman wasn't going to work. "I'm Special Agent Danny Taylor, this is Agent Spade, and this is Senior Agent Jack Malone."

"F.B.I." Angie said, reading their badges. Her demeanor changed immediately. No longer relaxed, they could practically see her wall of suspicion go up before their very eyes. She stiffened and her eyes narrowed. In a low voice, she said, "Then I suspect you already know my family name."

"We need your help, Dr. Sullivan." Jack said, also lowering his voice. "Is there somewhere we can speak in private?"

"I have nothing to say to you." Angie said, turning to walk away from them.

Jack caught up with her in two strides. In a hushed tone, he said, "Your brother, Eddie, has gone missing. We need your help to find him."

Angie stopped in the middle of the hallway and turned to look at him as Danny and Sam caught up to them. "Eddie?" She asked, in a whisper. Her face remained unreadable, but every emotion going through her was evident in her eyes. Fear. Sorrow. Confusion. She looked around at the three of them and then shook her head. "I haven't seen Eddie in over 15 years. I can't help you."

As she turned to walk away from them again, Jack grabbed her arm. She whirled back around to look at him, her eyes flashing with fire. "You may be the only one who can." He said, letting her go gently. "His wife and children are counting on you."

"You've seen Theresa?" Angie asked, surprise registering in her face.

"She came to us for help." Jack replied.

"How did you know his wife's name was Theresa?" Sam asked. "If you haven't seen him in 15 years?"

Angie glared at Sam, her dislike for her apparent. "I've heard."

Angie looked back at Jack and Danny and was quiet for a moment. Finally, she pushed open the door to the nearby room and gestured for them to join her inside. Once they were all inside the deserted room, Angie locked the door behind them. "No one here has any idea who my family is." she began. "I dropped the Caruso name when I left home at 16. I've been Angie Sullivan ever since. I have no desire to change any of that now."

"In my experience, people who change their names are usually running from something..." Sam began, before she was cut off.

"Or starting over." Danny quickly interrupted, eyeing Samantha. "With you, I am guessing the latter is true."

"We don't get to choose our parents, Agent Taylor." Angie said. "But we do get to choose how we live our lives in spite of them. Eddie made one choice. I made another."

"And now your brother is missing." Jack stated, eyeing this young woman with interest.

Angie straightened and turned toward the window, trying to mask the pain that was overwhelming her. "Unfortunately, Agent Malone, 'going missing' in my family usually means the kiss of death. You may be wasting your time."

"Your sister in law doesn't think so."

Looking out over the city, Angie was quiet for a moment. Finally she turned back to face them, her face once more unreadable. "I'm sure that Eddie is Theresa's whole world. She has to believe that he's only missing. But we all know that just isn't true, is it?"

"We work missing persons, Dr. Sullivan." Danny told her. "We devote our lives to believing that people are simply missing until we have proof otherwise."

"That's a fine sentiment, Agent Taylor. And I hope that you're right." Angie said, quietly. "But, I know where I come from. And I know that my brother was very good at his job. That's the only reason he stayed alive as long as he did." Angie turned back to the window and looked out over Central Park again. Quietly and firmly, she said, "But my Uncle Tony and my cousin Joey are good, too. There won't be any proof for you to find. Proof of life, or proof of death." A single tear rolled down her cheek and Angie quickly brushed it away before anyone could see it.

Gently, Sam said, "I worked with your cousin, Michael Sullivan, when I was with the NYPD. He's a good cop."

Angie turned away from the window again and accepted the peace offering Sam was giving her. She smiled through her sadness and said, "Yeah, he is. A good cop, a good cousin, a good man."

"Mike says that you and Eddie were very close once." Sam continued quietly, wondering if this new approach would lead anywhere.

"In another lifetime, we were. Thick as thieves, you know." Angie gave a short little laugh before saying, "We grew up together. Eddie, Mikey and me. In Hell's Kitchen, of all places."

"I thought the Caruso family has a compound in Bedford?" Danny asked.

"They do." Angie told him. "I was born there. But my mom grew up in Hell's Kitchen. My dad did a five year stint at Riker's when I was younger and my mom decided that she wanted to be closer to her own family. Mike's dad...my uncle Frank. So she moved us back there for awhile."

"Rough place to grow up." Danny remarked.

"Not as rough as the Caruso compound." Angie said quickly. "Actually, I felt safer during those years in Hell's Kitchen than I ever did in Bedford." Seeing their confused looks, Angie explained. "When we were growing up, Hell's Kitchen was like our own little closed-off world. The west side streets of Manhattan were our private playground. Believe it or not, we had a safety net there unlike in any other New York neighborhood. Because crimes against people of the neighborhood were not permitted. Benny Spinopolli ruled the streets with an iron fist. But to those of us who knew him, he was always 'King Benny'." The name of Hell's Kitchen's most notorious hit man rolled off her tongue like he was just any other guy. In reality, he had been a hit man for Lucky Luciano. "I had no idea he was more dangerous than my own father until after we had moved back to Bedford. He had always looked out for us kids in the neighborhood. I think he still runs his fish market in Hell's Kitchen." Angie smiled at the memory, then said. "It was a place of innocence, that just happened to be ruled by corruption. The innocence is gone now, but the corruption never died."

Danny shook his head at the fact that this woman was on a first name basis with killers like Benny Spinopolli and the Caruso boys. It was a new world they were working in.

"I used to follow Eddie and Mike around like a puppy dog. I worshipped them." The pain that came over Angie's face this time was not masked so easily. "Leaving Eddie behind was the hardest thing I ever had to do."

"What happened?" Jack prodded.

"My father died in prison. My mother died soon after. I had no reason to stay there any longer." Angie took a deep breath and said, "As you can well imagine, my father left me a sizable inheritance. I used it to pay for boarding school and left the Caruso's behind."

"And Eddie stayed?" Danny asked quietly.

She couldn't lift her head to look them in the eyes. Staring at the floor, she said, "Yes." Her voice broke as she repeated, "And Eddie stayed." Pulling herself together, Angie straightened and finally raised her head. The wall was back up and the agents knew that they had gotten as much out of her as they were going to get. "I haven't seen him since then. So I am sorry, agents, but like I said before...I have nothing more to say to you."

Sam and Danny looked to Jack, who moved toward the door. "Thank you for your help, Dr. Sullivan. We'll contact you when we find your brother."

Angie turned quickly to look at them as they left the room.

Out in the hallway, Sam stated flatly, "She's hiding something."

Jack smirked and said, "The total tonnage of what that woman is hiding could fill the Empire State Building. Not only do we have to find out what she is hiding, but we also have to figure out why she is protecting the family she claims to despise."

Danny shook his head. "I don't think she's protecting the family." He said, pushing the button for the elevator. "I think she's protecting Eddie. I don't buy for a second that she hasn't seen him in 15 years."

Back in the empty patient room, Angie wiped away the tears that she could no longer hold back. Dialing her cell phone, Angie waited for the person on the other end to pick up. When they did, Angie whispered urgently, "I just thought that you should know that the Feds just left. Do you want to tell me what the hell is going on?" She paused for a moment, then said, "We need to talk. Meet me by the duck pond in the park. And be careful."