"Daddy, when is Rach coming back?" Lian asked sleepily, the next night as Roy tucked her into bed.
"I'm not sure honey...Soon I hope." Roy frowned, he still had not told Lian that Rachael was missing, only that she had gone away for a little while thankfully the little girl had easily accepted that, she was used to different people in her life going away for different lengths of time most of them were in the hero line of work and were often called away on cases they were following.
"I miss Rach." Lian whispered as she became sleepier.
"I do to sweetheart." Roy replied as he gently stroked Lian's dark hair.
"I picked you a good Mommy didn't I?" Lian whispered, a smile playing on her lips.
"You picked the best Mommy." Roy replied, watching as the little girls eye's finally fluttered closed. He sat on the edge of her bed watching her sleep, as he often did when he felt stressed or worried, it always made him relax...A crash from outside broke the moment, and Roy rose and headed towards the door, he didn't hurry, he knew what the noise would be, Sam was in his play pen in the living room and the crash was just his way of getting attention by throwing one of his toy trucks over the side.
"Mom mom mom." the little boy chorused.
"Hey Sammy my boy..." Roy said as he reached in and picked the toddler up.
"Da." Sam replied.
Roy looked shocked for a moment, not sure if he had heard right.
"Da da." the little boy repeated as he wriggled in Roy's arms.
For the first time in days Roy smiled, Sam had a few words in his vocabulary now, but Dad wasn't one of them..Until now. Hearing the sound of a key in the door, he quickly walked towards it, still smiling as Dick opened it and walked in a bag of take out food in one arm.
"I brought Chinese food, because I'm pretty sure you wouldn't have eaten since I made you eat this morn..." Dick noticed the smile on Roy's face. "What?"
"He called me Dad!" Roy replied.
"What...were you expecting him to call you Mister Harper, maybe?" Dick joked.
"No, no..I just..Well I don't know what I was expecting." Roy shrugged, as he lowered the still squirming toddler to the floor.
"Well you've been the only man in the kids life for the last five or six months, he hears Lian call you Dad, of course he's gonna call you Dad." Dick said as he began to unpack the bag onto the coffee table.
"Yeah.. well doesn't matter how much your detective mind wants to break it down into facts..It's still a kick." Roy said as he retrieved a couple of forks and a bowl and spoon from the kitchen "You want a plate?" he asked.
"Nah..just eat from the carton." Dick said.."You got beer?" he asked.
"Yeah." Roy opened the fridge and pulled out a beer and a can of Zesti, holding both in one hand, he walked over and placed them on the coffee table along with the forks, spoon and bowl.
Dick reached across and grabbed the can of Zesti and headed back towards the fridge.
"Hey that was for me." Roy said indignantly.
"You don't need the caffeine man, your eye's are hanging out of your head as it is." Dick replied as he swapped the Zesti for a beer.
"I can't sleep." Roy mumbled.
"Not if you drink that shit you won't." Dick said as he sat in the sofa next to Roy.., who was busy, chopping noodles he had placed in the bowl up into smaller pieces with the side of the spoon.
Sam stood holding onto the side of the sofa, bouncing up and down in anticipation as he watched Roy readying the noodles for him to eat.
"So spill man...Anything yet?" Roy asked as he offered a spoonful of the chopped noodles to the little boy, who eagerly ate them.
"Bruce has got the footage from the security camera's in and around the clinic..he's going through them now, other than that we don't have a lot to go on, he wants to know a bit more about this ex boyfriend of hers though, anything at all you can remember..." Dick stopped as Roy cut in.
"I toldja everything I know,in all honesty it's a subject I didn't want to pry into too much, I've just let her open up and tell me things when she was ready, so all I really know is his name is Ryan and he's locked up." Roy said.
"Did she mention what prison he's in?" Dick asked.
"Not a standard prison...one for the criminally insane, that's all I know." Roy spooned another scoop of noodles into Sam's mouth and sighed.
"Well that's actually a bigger help than you think...It narrows the places to look down dramatically, if we can find this guy, we might be able to get some more answers there, he might know some information about her past that you..." Dick stopped as the doorbell rang. "I'll get it." he said, standing to go to the door.
"Don't know who the hell that'd be at this time of the night." Roy mumbled.
Dick opened the door slightly. "It's Ollie!" he said, opening the door further.
Oliver Queen walked in the door and dropped the bag he was carrying on the floor to one side of the doorway.
Roy stood quickly."Oliie?...What the hell?"
"Hey kid...The Bat called me, told me to return your call...I figured it had ta be something big if he was calling me on the JLA communicator..So..." Ollie's voice trailed off as Sam toddled around to hang onto Roy's leg.
The little boy looked up, and Roy automatically reached down to pick him up. Sam leaned his head against Roy's shoulder. "Da." he said.
Ollie stared at the toddler in his ex wards arms.."Shit kid, don't ya ever learn your lesson." he snapped.