Chapter Nine


Epiphany enjoyed her lunch today. She says you can never go wrong with chili from Kelly's. I think if I had won the pool I would have gotten something a little fancier, although the corn bread is to die for. Even better than my favorite chocolate croissant in Paris. You would have thought I would have won the pool having been a keen observer and victim of Patrick's "flirting," as well as his, hmm, I'm not sure what to call myself. Sex partner? Seems too cold and demeaning. Lover, seems too intimate and emotional. Sex-crazed colleague? Great, now I'm starting to sound like Patrick in my own journal. Speaking of whom…Liz, Epiphany and I were laughing the other day about Patrick's pathetic and, Liz says frantic, flirting around the hospital these days (they both know we're sleeping together, which can only mean everyone knows but I can't even go there in my head). He had just tried to flirt with some new candy striper and she almost burst into tears, which made all of us almost keel over in laughter and somehow we decided to start a pool and take count of how many times Patrick flirts over a period of 7 days. None of us counted into the tally, which didn't stop any of us from trying to cheat and set Patrick up with opportunities to flirt (as if he needs help with that). Frankly, the hilarity of the competition eased, and I'll only admit it here, the jealousy that sometimes hits me when Patrick is particularly interested in someone else – feelings I know I shouldn't have, but I guess are natural when you are being physically intimate with someone. Natural for me, anyway. Quite a few times we caught Patrick looking at us suspiciously since we were usually giggling when he was around or lurking around the hospital spying on him. In the end, Epiphany won using the "Price is Right" method – the closest without going over. Sad to say I underestimated his ability to work flirt into his work day. Liz over estimated. Epiphany was almost right – 137. Amazing. Next, we're going to bet on how many times he can wear that sweater vest in a month. Like almost anything it's hot on him but makes him look like he's trying a bit too hard with his appearance, which never ceases to amuse me.

"I'd really like to find a way to work in some pleasure while I'm here."

"Well then. Let me buy you another drink."

Angela Dennis was just what Patrick needed tonight. She was fun, flirty, and looking for someone just like him. A quick, no strings attached fuck. His specialty.

His first mistake was not pulling her off the barstool and taking her into the bathroom right then and there. His second mistake was thinking about taking her into the bathroom. Robin. That night at The Kells. "Shit."

"What?"

"Nothing. Go on." Patrick put a forced smile on his face and laughed at her anecdote. He couldn't believe it. For the first time in his life, he had no interest in a sure thing. 'Dammit Robin, you have ruined me,' he thought. He heard Angela talking about her latest PR success and nodded his head, hoping she thought he was paying attention. 'What am I doing here? I should just get up and –'

Suddenly, he looked up, silently scanning the crowd when suddenly he saw her. Robin, smiling at him, weaving in and out of the crowd in slow motion, wearing that gorgeous red dress he loved. He followed her with his eyes, saw her laughing, her eyes sparkling and staring back at him. She stepped behind a pillar and he lost sight of her, so he slid off his stool and craned his neck. And there she was – Heather from Banana Republic. "What the-" Patrick whispered.

"I'm sorry?"

"Angela, I've got to run. I see someone I know." Distractedly, Patrick made his way over and stopped in front of her. "Heather, what are you doing here?"

"I don't really know." She looked around nervously. "Can we talk?"

"Sure." He steered her over to a corner booth in the back of the bar and flagged down a cocktail waitress. "What can I get you?"

"Oh, nothing."

"No, no I insist." Patrick looked over and smiled at her, willing her to be comfortable. If Aidan wasn't going to let him play with the truth serum, he'd improvise with his own - colorful, fruity girly drinks with paper umbrellas. "You've got to try their strawberry daiquiris. They are decadent."

Heather gave a tentative smile and nodded. "Okay, you talked me into it."

"Excellent." He looked at the waitress. "Two of those please."

Two strawberry daiquiris, one pina colada and a midori sour later, Heather was finally loosened up and ready to talk.

"You're so nice, Patrick."

"Well, it's easy to be nice to a beautiful woman."

She clucked her tongue and swatted at his arm, laughing, and then turned serious. "You shouldn't be nice to me. I did a horrible thing."

'Now we're getting somewhere,' Patrick thought. "Heather, I don't think you could ever do anything horrible."

"No, no, I did. I lied to you. I never saw that girl."

Patrick felt a chill go up his spine. "You never saw Robin? Why did you tell us that you did?"

Heather started crying, big fat tears rolling down her cheeks. "They gave me a lot of money to tell you this story and it didn't seem like a big deal. I really need the money – do you know how much I make at the store? It's not nearly enough to live on, and I want to go back to school. I don't want to work in retail all my life. And, and," she was sobbing so hard she struggled to take a breath. "It didn't seem like it would hurt anybody, so I did it. But then I saw your face." She stopped sobbing and rubbed away the tears. "She's your girlfriend, isn't she?"

Patrick stared at her a moment before nodding yes.

"You really care about her." Patrick was looking at his hands. Heather didn't wait for a response before she continued. "I don't know where Robin is, but I just couldn't stay quiet in case she's in trouble. I couldn't live with myself."

"Thank you, Heather."

"Oh God."

"What? Are you okay?" Huh, it's true, people really can turn green,' Patrick thought.

"I think I'm gonna be sick." She sprang up from her chair and ran to the ladies room.

Patrick stared after her and then turned his attention back to the table. 'Well that was an interesting string of events,' he thought. What the heck it all meant he didn't know. Who were the "they" who had paid off Heather? Why did they want them all to believe Robin was in Toronto? There were a million questions, but he did know one thing. He had been right about Heather the whole time, and he planned on rubbing this little detail in Super Spy Aidan's nose all night. He pulled out his cell phone and dialed the Brit.

"Voicemail. Of course. Hey Aidan, it's Patrick. Listen, I'm at the hotel bar and I've just finished talking with Heather from Banana Republic. I was right. She lied to us and she just admitted it to me. What do I do next? Do we take her in for questioning, or do they only do that on NYPD Blue? Call me." He flipped the phone shut and looked around the room. Maybe he should check on her. It was his fault after all, that she was puking her guts out. "Dear, sweet, Heather. Never mix your alcohols." He got up and walked over to the ladies room, knocking on the door. "Heather?" No answer. He knocked louder. "Anyone in there?" Still no answer. Looking around, he slowly pushed the door in and peeked inside. It was empty. "Shit." He lost her.


It had been a long 24 hours. When Aidan had returned that night, Patrick had debriefed him on what he had uncovered and then they had gone to work trying to find Heather. Using employment records, Patrick did not want to know how he had gotten those at 3am, they found her last name – Carmichael - and her address. She wasn't there. The next day they stopped by Banana Republic and were told that she hadn't shown up for her morning shift and no one had heard from her. Heather Carmichael had vanished into thin air.

On the plane ride home, Aidan briefed him on what Anna's contact had discovered - that there were rumors underground that the WSB had grabbed a woman. He couldn't tell him her name, just that she was small – petite – and feisty.

"Robin."

"Could be. Only caveat is rumor has it she was snatched in Rome."

"Rome? How the hell did Robin get to Rome?"

"I don't know. This could have nothing to do with my cousin."

'It's got to be linked,' Patrick thought. He looked over at Aidan and he could see that Aidan was thinking the same thing.

Upon touching down at Manchester International Airport they were leveled with more bad news. The final American Airlines counter agent, Bill Roberts was missing as well. He had never returned after leaving to pick up dinner for his family the night before. His wife had called in a missing persons report hours earlier.

On the drive back to Port Charles, Aidan called his PI partner back in Pine Valley, Tad Martin, to put out some feelers and start searching for Heather and Bill. When he got off the phone he looked over at Patrick. "I'm taking you to Robin's?"

"Yeah." Patrick had been quiet on the drive home. He didn't know what to make of all the information swirling around in his head, and he was relieved when they finally pulled up outside of Robin's building.

"You did good, Mate."

"I let Heather get away."

"Rookie mistake. Happens to us all. Don't worry, we'll find her." Aidan pulled away from the curb and left Patrick standing on the sidewalk, alone, staring at the retreating Yukon. He sighed, looked up at Robin's building and then entered and slowly walked up the stairs.

They had agreed to shower and change and meet back at Noah's. Aidan had some more phone calls to make and Patrick agreed to print out the photos they had taken on Robin's photo printer. She had invested in a good one – the girl loved to take pictures. He hadn't posed for so many pictures in his life as he had since he and Robin had begun dating. Apparently, everything had to be immortalized.

He made his way into her office, dropping his bags on the floor and settling into her desk chair, firing up the computer. He figured he should check her email first. "Scorpio, you need a better junk filter. 47 new emails, 30 for Viagra, 10 for that other blue pill." He shook his head and hit delete. "Well, you certainly don't need those." He opened up each of the other seven, one by one, skimming the contents and hitting print. He'd take them with him, see if Anna or Aidan could find anything interesting. She had a couple of jokes forwarded to her from friends in Paris – at least he thought they were jokes. His French wasn't very good. There were a couple of bill pay reminders and another email from Dr. Laurent, the author of that New England Journal of Medicine article. He put that pile aside and pulled out the camera memory card, plugging it into the printer. He set the controls so that each picture printed out at 8x10, grabbed a stack of photo paper and hit print. The slow chugging of the printer at work made him antsy. He looked through the camera bag and pulled out the blown up picture of Robin at the ATM. He lovingly traced her outline, blowing out a breath. The printer continued to work hard, spitting out its first image: the sculpture he photographed for her across from the Scotia Bank. He picked it up and looked at it. Suddenly, something snapped in his brain. He grabbed the picture of Robin at the bank and put it side by side with the picture of the sculpture. "How did I not notice this before?"

Patrick leaped up from the chair, grabbing at the email printouts and the photos that had printed so far, stuffing them into the camera bag. He slung the bag over his shoulder, grabbed his keys and ran out the door, leaving the printer on to print out the remaining photos unattended. He sprinted to his car, knowing that he needed to get to Noah's immediately. In the picture of Robin at the ATM that Donely had given them, the sculpture, that should have been right behind her, was nowhere to be found.

TBC