Chapter Four

Faith pulled the glass double doors open and strode into the lobby with all the arrogance she could muster, Katie and Elena flanking her like bodyguards. The receptionist watched them come toward her, one waxed eyebrow arched in disdain. Faith smiled thinly, knowing they couldn't look more out of place in an establishment like Wolfram & Hart if they sported blue skin and horns. Actually, they'd probably fit right in if they did.

Faith reached the receptionist's desk and leaned on it, giving the woman her best stone-cold killer look. The receptionist, to her credit, merely popped her gum and said, "I'm sorry, I don't think—" Her computer beeped, and she glanced at the screen. Her eyes widened, and she swallowed. Turning back to Faith, she said, "Can I help you?"

They must have a Slayer detector. Handy. "Yeah, I want Wesley Wyndham-Pryce's notes. Whatever he left," Faith said.

The receptionist blinked twice, her face falling into shock before she resumed her smile. "Just one moment, please." She picked up her phone, pushed two buttons, and said, "Yes sir, there's a young woman here about Mr. Wyndham-Pryce's papers. Mm-hmm. Of course, sir." She replaced the receiver, smiled some more. "Mr. Norberry will be right out to assist you."

"Thanks." Faith straightened and took a step backward, slipping the business card she'd palmed into her back pocket. Katie tilted her head back, examining the high, high ceiling. She whistled quietly in awe. Elena crossed herself. Faith agreed with both of them.

Mr. Norberry was indeed right out, and he was just what Faith figured the head of Wolfram & Hart's library section would look like: exactly like Wes when he was still a Watcher. Tall, gangly, slick hair, glasses. He walked toward her, grinning, one hand stretched out before him in order to shake hers as soon as possible.

"Hello and very nice to meet you, Miss…" He even sounded like Wes; same prissy accent.

"Faith." She applied a little more pressure to the handshake than was strictly necessary, but it was fun to watch his eyes pop wide.

"Ah," he said, politely extracting his hand from her grip and giving it a slight shake. "The Vampire Slayer. Very nice to meet you." His eyes took in Katie and Elena. "And these young ladies are?"

"My associates," Faith drawled.

He gave her a little nod. "Of course. If you would please follow me?"

Faith tossed a glance over her shoulders at the younger Slayers, letting them know she was in charge. She'd dealt with Wolfram & Hart people before; she just hoped she was still up to it.

Norberry talked a lot. As they waited for the elevator, he smiled at each of them in turn and said, "Mr. Wyndham-Pryce's father wished for Mr. Wyndham-Pryce's notes to go to the new Watcher's Council, so we've been waiting for you. Not you, specifically, of course. We had no idea who they'd send. Though I am rather surprised they sent Slayers." The elevator arrived, and Norberry ushered them inside. The doors closed silently, and Norberry continued talking. "We would have mailed them, of course, but we had a bit of, ah, trouble finding the new headquarters."

He looked at Faith hopefully, but she merely stared at him. Of course they couldn't find the Watcher headquarters; there wasn't one, unless you counted Giles' house in England, and Willow had applied one of her super masking spells to that.

"I was going to be a Watcher," Norberry said, lifting his eyes to gaze wistfully over the top of her head. "Lucky, I guess, that I accepted this offer instead. Wolfram & Hart really does have an amazing library. I imagine the Watcher's Council's collection was destroyed in the explosion. Have you managed to rebuild at all?"

There was another long silence. When he realized Faith wasn't going to tell him anything useful, or indeed speak at all, something flashed in Norberry's eyes. He covered quickly by awkwardly ducking his head, swallowing, and saying, "Yes, well…"

Faith didn't think she could be more on edge, but she felt muscles she didn't even know she had tighten in her back. She managed to keep her face mostly blank, with just a touch of sneer. Norberry cleared his throat and watched the numbers at the top of the door click their way to twenty-seven and then stop.

The elevator door slid open, and Norberry led them down another hall. Faith stumbled on her first step, glad Norberry's back was to her, as she was sure her shock registered on her face.

They were walking down the hall from her dream. Wolfram & Hart had redecorated since she'd been here last, but she supposed when one had to completely rebuild a building, it was no big effort to change the color palate. As they passed an open door, she heard a female voice say, "Yes? No, I'm afraid he's unavailable at the moment. Perhaps you'd like to make an appointment?" As they continued past the door, the voice followed them. "I'm sorry, but you're not his only case."

She shouldn't have been so surprised. The dreams were visions, after all. The first one had shown her where Angel died, had shown her his son. Was it so crazy for it to show her the halls of Wolfram & Hart? They just seemed like such mundane details, the color of the walls, that painting, the secretary's words. At least she knew she was in the right place.

Norberry stopped in front of a set of wooden, double doors. He pulled a card from his breast pocket and slid it into a slot above the door handle, like a hotel room key. The lock beeped, and he opened the door, gesturing for the Slayers to precede him into the room.

It was a library, of course, dark and close and intimidating. Faith's eyes scanned the rows of shelves, the large wooden desks, and she thought how at home Wesley must have been here.

Norberry walked to one of the desks and pushed a button on the discreet intercom built into its corner. "Could you bring the Wyndham-Pryce files up, please? Thank you." He straightened. "It'll just be a few moments. Can I offer you some refreshment? Coffee? A pastry, perhaps?"

"No, thanks," she said stiffly. She stared at him, her arms crossed, until he looked away.

"You, miss?" Norberry asked, addressing Elena.

"No hablo inglés," Elena said flatly.

Norberry blinked and turned to Katie.

"What she said," Katie said, a lazy grin crawling across her face.

"Erm, yes," Norberry said. He cleared his throat.

Faith heard a door whoosh open somewhere in the depths of the library, and Norberry visibly relaxed. "Ah, here they are."

Three guys pushing dollies filed into the room. On each dolly sat two large boxes, sealed with packing tape. The way the men let them fall to floor upon stopping in a neat row testified to how heavy the boxes were. Faith felt her shoulders droop at the prospect at the vast amount of reading that lay in her future. There was a reason she'd dropped out of school; too much reading.

Norberry produced a form seemingly from the air and held it toward Faith along with a pen. "Just a release form," he said in explanation, thrusting the paper and pen at her again.

Faith took them warily and began to read. The page was completely full of small print and big words, but she was fairly certain it was indeed just a release form, stating that Wolfram & Hart was not responsible for any damage to the item or items in question or for any further damage she may cause to them or with them.

She bent over a desk and signed the form, using only her first name and purposely altering her handwriting. Just in case.

"Would you like us to help you out?" Norberry asked, his gesture toward the men with the dollies stating that he really meant they would help the Slayers out.

"Nah," Faith said, waving Katie and Elena forward. "We can get it." They each took two boxes, hefting them easily. This was especially impressive in Elena's case, as Faith was sure the two boxes she carried weighed more than she did.

"We'll see ourselves out, all right?" Faith said over her load, not waiting for an answer before moving through the doors.

"It was a pleasure to meet you," Norberry called after them. His voice was a vast pool of eagerness hiding beneath politeness, but his words made the back of Faith's neck tingle, and she hoped they wouldn't have to stay in L.A. for long.

Once they were safely outside, Faith flagged down a cab. The managed to shove four of the boxes in the cab's trunk, and sat with the other two on their laps in the back seat as the cab took them back to their motel.

"As much as you talked that place up, how big, bad, and evil it was,"—Katie waved her hands mockingly on he word "evil"—"the only scary thing I saw was some guy's toupee. That librarian Watcher dude certainly seemed harmless enough."

"He wasn't a Watcher," Faith muttered. "I've known Watchers, and he wasn't a Watcher."

"Came off awful bookish to me."

"He wasn't bookish."

"Then what was he?" Elena said.

Faith looked at her, then at Katie. "A very good actor."

Katie frowned. "Why would someone pretend to be a dork just to give us a bunch of notes?"

"That's what worries me," Faith said.

Elena shuddered, her eyes unfocusing slightly. "It is an evil place. I could feel it."

Katie snorted. "It's just a law firm. I've known lots of lawyers, believe me. Jerks, the lot of them, and probably evil, but nothing to get all jumpy about, and certainly nothing worth staking." She paused, looking thoughtful. "Well, maybe some of them."

"You haven't met Wolfram & Hart lawyers," Faith said. "They're not just lawyers, they're…" She struggled for the right words. "They work for the bad guys. The bad guys."

Katie leaned against the car door, eyes narrowed. "How come you know so much about this Wolfram & Hart place?"

Faith looked out the window, the echo of the thrill of slamming a snotty lawyer's face against a table multiple times quivering in her mind. "Angel fought them," she said, watching the storefronts pass by.

"And then he joined them," Katie added.

Faith's head snapped around. "To fight from the inside," she bit out. "As I've clearly explained before."

Katie lifted her hands in surrender. "Whatever. Just tryin' to get my facts straight."

Faith turned back to the window, leaning her forehead against the glass and wondering if there really were such things as facts anymore.

It took seven hours. Seven hours and three boxes of reading and scanning and digging through boxes of paper, until their backs ached and their eyes were bleary, but they found it.

"Connor," Faith said quietly, lifting a single sheet of paper, half full of Wesley's now intimately familiar handwriting. The rest of the pages on her lap slid to the floor.

"Gracias a Dios," Elena sighed, throwing her stack of notes away from her in an uncharacteristic display of frustration.

Katie grinned at her, then turned to Faith with an expectant, "Well?"

Faith read Wesley's notes aloud, her voice shaking slightly in excitement.

"'Reilly, Laurence and Colleen. Son hit by van going fifty or sixty miles an hour. Boy was crushed between van and garage. Boy virtuallyunscathed.'" Faith looked up. "Wes underlined the last two words like eight times."

"Sounds like something the son of a vampire would do," Katie said somewhat grudgingly, "popping back up after getting mowed down by a van. Was this during the day?"

Faith ignored her and continued reading. "Son's name: Connor. Age: 18. Previous demonstrations of superhuman ability: None.'" Faith looked up again, lowering the paper to her lap and smiling. "And there's an address."

Doyle needed a drink. Convenient, then, that he held a bottle of brandy in his right hand.

He'd visited every demon bar he could remember and a few that he didn't, and all he got for his trouble was the repeated phrase, "You're crazy, man." A few demons with an overdeveloped sense of humor simply laughed at him, and on three occasions he found himself sprinting down the street to escape a fight he was guaranteed to lose.

Other than the complete lack of information, though, he had to admit it had gone much better than he'd expected. He hadn't run into anyone he actually knew—most of whom he still owed money—had only suffered a black eye and a split lip from a cranky Kilgoth demon that had slammed its gigantic mug into his face rather than answer a question, and, most importantly, he hadn't run into any of the Slayers from the bus. He'd be tempted to thank the Powers, but they didn't actually care. More likely, he was finally getting back some of that "luck of the Irish" that had abandoned him ten years ago. The more bars he went to, the more jumpy the patrons were, and it didn't take a genius to figure out the Slayers had been there before him, smashing heads and asking the same questions. It could only be luck that had kept them from crossing paths, and for that he was extremely grateful. For all its faults, Doyle was rather fond of his head. He also took comfort in the fact that, despite their more persuasive methods, the Slayers hadn't learned anything either. The demons thought they were just as crazy as he was.

And if they were just as crazy as he was, then they probably weren't any closer to finding Connor than he was. It wasn't a large victory— technically not even a victory—but he'd take it.

He worked the bottle of brandy open and took a swig, never taking his eyes off the name carved into the stone in front of him: CORDELIA CHASE. He poured the rest of the bottle onto the grass at his feet and dropped it.

"Hey, Princess," he said quietly. He looked down at himself and smiled sadly. "I'm wearing that shirt you hate." He tugged on the collar. "I guess you hated them all. I got rid of some of them—mostly because I turned them funny colors in the laundry, but still. They're gone." He shifted his weight, feeling the spring of the grass and the cushion of the earth beneath his feet. He wanted to touch the headstone, touch her. Instead he shoved his hands into his trouser pockets and took a step back.

"I just wanted to stop by since I was in town," he continued. "You're the only one with any sort of grave." He cleared his throat, wishing he hadn't dumped all the brandy onto the ground. "I'm trying to find Connor. So far…well, at least I knew you wouldn't tell me I was crazy, trying to find the miracle son of a vampire. You knew him, I know that. The vision was pretty, um, detailed." He crouched and pulled up a handful of grass, then threw it into the breeze. The blades fluttered back to him and stuck to the legs of his trousers. "I know that wasn't you who came back, wasn't you who did all those horrible things. I'm just surprised you fell for that whole 'higher being' schlock in the first place." He smiled again. "You, Cordy? Come on. I don't care how much the visions changed you, you were never cut out for sainthood."

He stood and put his hands back in his pockets. He kicked one of his legs, trying to dislodge the grass. "I know you loved him, too. Only right, I guess."

He stood for several seconds, letting the breeze play with his hair as he finally accepted that she was gone, that Angel was gone. It had been comforting to him, going about his ineffective life in Atlanta, to know that they were here, fighting, doing what they could to make things better. Now it was up to him, which meant the world was probably in trouble.

He bent and picked up the empty bottle. "Well, I should go. Got a kid to find and—"
He squeezed his eyes shut and bared his teeth and pain flared in his skull. He dropped to his hands and knees as images burst against his eyelids.

Connor. Laughing, playing, being hugged and held and loved by a family. Connor growing up. Connor going to school. Connor discovering what he was. Connor at Stanford. Connor in San Francisco.

A street, a building, a door, a number.

Doyle panted as the pain and images receded. He collapsed and rolled onto his back, squinting up at the sky, his head resting on the slight mound of Cordy's grave. He forced his hands open, releasing fistfuls of grass and dirt.

"What was that?" he asked. This life clashed completely with his previous vision, the one with a heavy dose of hell, both in this dimension and in another. But this? This normality? How did the kid have two lives?

A smell lingered in his nostrils—part of the full-package visions that involved all five senses—and he realized it was magic. Strong magic.

The last piece of the puzzle fell into place, and Doyle laughed. Just like Angel's self-torturing ways to give up his son in order to make him happy.

"That would have been nice to know a couple weeks ago," he said to the sky. "I really didn't need the Demon's Reunion Tour of L.A."

He pushed himself to his feet, brushing at the grass stains on his knees. He had dirt under his fingernails and his hands smelled vaguely of brandy. He sighed and picked the bottle back up, then paused as his eyes came to rest on the words CORDELIA CHASE once more. He glanced at the sky and then back down. He smiled.

"Thanks, Cordy," he said.