Chapter Ten

Not wanting John to change his mind, Natalie wasted no time in pulling out her cell phone and calling her brother. Luckily for both their sakes, as usual Rex was lurking around the police station anyways. Within minutes he was out of Bo's office and into John's, a huge smile plastered on his face.

"So the mighty McBain finally admits he needs help!" Rex said with his usual cocky attitude.

"I knew this was a mistake…" John muttered under his breath.

Seeing that this was about to become a disaster, Natalie quickly stood up and intervened. Hands on her hips she fixed them both with a hard look. "Okay both of you listen up because I am only going to say this once. I get you two aren't all buddy-buddy, and that's fine you don't have to be. But you," With this Natalie pointed at John, "You need answers about your father's murder and whether you like it or not for that we need Rex." Whirling she faced her brother. "And you need any work you can get. Last time I checked Bo didn't have any open cases for you. So you two can drop the snarky comments and the eye rolling and actually act like grown men for a chance. Okay?"

Both shocked by her outburst, John and Rex just nodded, neither one of them wanting to piss her off further. Convinced that all was well, Natalie sat back down, a satisfied smile on her face.

John took the next ten minutes to fill Rex in, but left out any of the details pertaining to Natalie being in the alley, or Walter's possible involvement. After explaining what he needed from the hospital, Rex nodded and assured them both he could easily get that information – something John wasn't so sure he believed. But, as Natalie had said, it was worth a shot.

Rex told them he would take a trip to Trenton General first thing in the morning and meet them back at the station in the afternoon to tell them what he learned.

The next day as promised Rex was back in John's office by one o'clock, a large grin on his face. "I got what you wanted," he said as he let himself into the office and took a seat beside Natalie.

John and Natalie had spent most of the day on the phone following leads about the convenience store robbery and talking to both John's contacts at the New Jersey PD and the FBI about potential blackmarket sales at the time. Unfortunately, neither of contact had any information and once again they were out of leads.

"It was a lot easier then I expected," Rex said as he leaned back in the chair and put his feet up on John's desk.

Seeing the annoyed look in John's eyes, Natalie pushed her brother's legs off the desk and shot him a look that told him to watch it. Sighing, Rex sat up a bit straighter and continued his story.

"I went up to the hospital admin and told her I was a reporter from the New York Times, and was there to interview some of the dedicated nurses that made up their wonderful hospital. Explained it as an article that would help show the public how important these dedicated individuals are to our community."

Natalie couldn't help but roll her eyes. "She actually bought that?"

Rex nodded, a huge grin spreading across his face. "Oh she just lapped it up, started to tell me how much her job helped the overall running of the hospital and gave me a few things to quote her on. The things people will do for their fifteen minutes of fame."

"She didn't try to verify your story?" John asked wanting to stick to the case.

"No need to," Rex replied as he reached into his pocket and threw John a New York Times ID badge that had his picture on it. "Pretty good eh? I have a friend who…"

Knowing this was something he shouldn't be hearing; John held up his hand to stop him and pushed the badge back. "I'm going to pretend I never saw that."

Shrugging, Rex continued. "So anyways, I asked to speak to two nurses, specifically one that just started, so I could get the thoughts of a younger person that was just starting out in the field." Seeing his sisters raised eyebrow and knowing what she was thinking, Rex faked being hurt. "I had to keep up the appearance of being on a story, not everything is about sex with me Natty."

"We don't need to know about that interview," John said dryly and for the millionth time wondered if he had made a mistake by bringing Rex in on this.

"No, you really don't." Rex said winking at John before continuing. "So I also asked to speak to someone who had worked there for about twenty-five years, you know to see what the differences in opinions were. She introduced me to a few people, but the second I met the make nurse, my mind was made up."

"A male nurse?" Natalie questioned, unable to hide her surprise that Rex hadn't picked a woman.

Rex nodded. "Most of the female nurses were in their fifties or sixties, and they didn't look like the type that would be impressed by my charm. The male nurse was early forties, and obviously very gay. I figured since Bo and I did the whole gay couple thing on the Colson case, I had it covered."

Really not wanting to think of her uncle and brother pretending to be a couple, Natalie rushed him on. "So?"

Obviously enjoying this, Rex smiled. "The guy was really nice, tried asking me out but luckily I had a picture of my wonderful boyfriend on me." Rex made quotation marks with his fingers at the word boyfriend. "He understood, and said you had really soulful eyes," Rex said turning to John.

John nearly spit out the coffee he had just taken a sip of. "You pretended John was your boyfriend?" Natalie asked trying not to smile at the grimace on John's face.

Rex nodded, obviously taking pleasure in the situation. "I had to; his was the only picture I had."

"You had my picture on you?" John growled, now definitely knowing he had made a mistake.

"I accidentally took it out of Natty's wallet when I borrowed some money." Turning to his sister he beamed at her. "In owe you twenty bucks."

Realizing that both John and Natalie looked like they were about to kill him, Rex hurried on. "So I started by asking him routine questions, why did you become a nurse? Do you like it? What duties do you have, you know crap like that. Then I asked how the hospital would deal with hypothetical situations. After going through a few, I posed the question of a Doctor or nurse who had been drinking. He sort of tensed up at that one, and then responded that they would be fired and their license revoked. But because I noticed his reaction I pressed him for details, asked if that had ever happened there and assured him this was totally off the record."

"And?"

'Well, he got quiet for a bit; I guess he was trying to figure out if he could trust me, but I assured him he could. Flashed him my trademark smile." Rex demonstrated by plastering a smile on his face for effect. "It worked and he told me that about twenty-two or twenty-three years ago they had had a case like that. Explained that he hadn't been working at the time, but when he came in the next day it was all over the hospital."

"Did he give you a name?" Natalie asked excitedly.

Rex nodded, but suddenly his face turned incredibly serious. "It took a lot of pressuring, but he did. But listen guys, this is where it gets weird. The drunken doctor that was on call that night, was a Dr. Paige Truman… the woman that is now known as Paige Miller."

Both Natalie and John's heads shot up in shock. "Are you sure? I mean I am sure there are a lot of women out there named Paige…" Natalie said, for the first time hoping for her Uncle Bo's sake this information was wrong.

Rex shook his head. "I'm going to let you guys in on a secret. Bo came to me awhile back, told me that Paige used to be married to Spencer Truman and that she had given birth to a son and given him up for adoption. He wanted me to help find that son for her. I ended up finding the information she needed and gave it to her, but I never looked at the results, but on the adoption record her name was signed Paige Truman." Rex shot John a sympathetic look before continuing. "There is no doubt about it; Paige Miller was the doctor that operated drunk on your father."