2015: If you have been following my story, in the process of rewriting I have deleted old chapters so there's no confusion while reading - it killed me a little bit to delete them, but I did it…for the story! *unbridled sobbing* almost half a decade of views! Sorry for all the changes, delays and long waits (and the fact that you may have to re-read from Chapter 4), but I hope you all stick around and enjoy the story! *SOB*

Bellarive – Lazarus

Nine Inch Nails – We're in this together

In the house – In a heartbeat

Chapter 8 – Is That a Hangover or Are You Just Unhappy to See Me?

Angela gasped as Leon's calloused hands skimmed the sensitive flesh of her breasts and his lips traced over her collarbone. His teasing feather light touches were torturous, sending surges of pleasure through her body, but never satisfying. She writhed beneath him, begging for more, but he wouldn't give in. He was deriving too much pleasure from exploring her body to end it just yet. He could feel her soft skin heat up as his hands stroked her inner thighs and it thrilled him to see this strong woman yield to him so freely, to hear her moaning his name for more. He wanted to be the only man whose name she called out like that. The thought of anyone else experiencing her like this made him jealous and he roughly clutched her breast as he lightly bit her neck to mark her as his. It seemed to excite her more as he captured her lips in a rough kiss and she responded by twisting her fingers into the soft hairs at the nape of his neck pulling him closer. She sighed as he moved his lips to her neck, then between the valley of her chest and then to her stomach. He didn't move further south, instead appreciating the contented glow in her face as he looked back up at her. She reached her hand down to stroke his jaw and brought his face back up towards her to kiss him tenderly and rest her cheek against his as she whispered how much she felt for him.

They looked at each other and their lips were about to meet again when there was a beeping sound. Leon got up with a start and looked around. He was in his apartment, alone, and his cell phone was ringing. Damn his imagination! It had felt so good that now he was feeling …uncomfortable. His very realistic dream had resulted in a bit of a problem which he would have to remedy with a very, very cold shower. Answering his phone, he recognised Hunnigans voice on the line, "What do you have for me Hunnigans?"

"Are you okay Leon? Your voice sounds a bit gruff."

"Yeah, you just…woke me up."

"Right. Not much info on MfE. Small organisation, 100-200 at most. However, they've gotten more active, and there have been some considerably large money transfers into their account. Unfortunately we couldn't trace it, but it looks like your vacation is going to have to be cut short. We'll need you to investigate this further."

"Got it." The line went dead on the other end and Leon slumped back into bed silently cursing Hunnigans for waking him up and himself for enjoying the dream so much. He'd had dreams about Angela before, but none had been as vivid as the one he'd just had. It must have been because of last night, when he had felt her luscious skin beneath his fingertips, her sinuous body rubbing up against his…damn it! He really needed that cold shower right now.

Angela was relaxing on her sofa with a cup of tea. Melissa had helped Angela back to her own apartment when she woke up in the morning and she was glad to be in her own space to recover. After hearing some of the details and remembering some of last night's events she wanted to be somewhere she felt safe and familiar. She felt miserable from the effects of the drugs she'd been given, Dr Hershey had said that recovery varied, but said she would at least be fit for duty within the next few days.

"So…who's this Leon fellow?" Melissa asked her as she sat down next to Angela on the sofa.

Angela blushed furiously at the mention of Leon's name. She had dreamt about him while she was under the influence of the drugs and she didn't know whether she had mentioned him to Melissa or whether she had called out his name in her sleep. "He's…someone I know. Did…I talk a lot in my sleep?"

It seemed Angela didn't realise that Leon had actually been there, but before she set her straight she wanted to find out more about him and whether she really should tell Angela the truth. "I'm sorry, you don't need to talk about it if you don't want to, plus you're recovering so perhaps you should just take it easy."

"No, I want to talk about it and the things I started telling you last night. I need to get it off my chest because I haven't felt like I could honestly express them before. It might be a long story though."

"I've got all day and you've been there for me when I needed you. Take your time."

Melissa had been very understanding as Angela told her about her past, mostly about Curtis, his wife…and her dear nephew. She talked about Leon with more brevity, after all there wasn't really that much she could say about him, but she did reveal the impact he had had on her. She had felt a bond with him, especially during the traumatic experience at the WilPharma facilities; and there had been a strong attraction that had developed between them during the brief period of time they had been together. It had awoken an interest in her that she hadn't wanted to pursue for a while – the idea of a more intimate relationship with someone else. However, it seemed like a pointless result because the interest didn't extend to other men and she hadn't seen Leon again. They'd talked late into the afternoon and Melissa had decided to fix up something for them to eat. Angela got up to stretch her legs when she noticed a large brown envelope at her front door. It must have been slipped under her door and she opened it on the way back to the sofa.

Her stomach dropped and she felt weak in the knees as she looked at the contents. Shock and disbelief hit her as she looked at the image of a creature looking a lot like Curtis after the G-virus transformed him. She braced herself against the wall as she inhaled deeply. The pictures had slid from her grasp and fallen to the floor in front of her. She closed her eyes against the images that elicited both fear and fury. She clutched her fist as she tried to steady her emotions and the slight tremor running through her hand. How could it not be over? The photos were gut-wrenching, but she couldn't ignore them for long. Someone had risked their life to get this information out…to her. She couldn't turn a blind eye, she had to follow it up. And she had to see this through for Curtis and for the unfortunate victims.

"I have a new appreciation of how disturbing these photos are after what you've told me today Angela. What…are you going to do?"

"I'm going to find whoever's doing this and bring them to justice."

They were tough words from Angela and Melissa guessed she was probably feeling more than she let on. "No chance that they've been faked?"

"I don't think so. And that would bring up the question of why someone would put these sort of photos under my door if they weren't real. I have an idea of who would be able to help investigate this issue, but…I have no way of contacting him. Out of…curiosity I had tried to find out more about Leon, but there was very little information to find and I have no way of contacting him. I could try taking it to some higher ups, but after WilPharma…I'm wary of the consequences if the wrong people are informed. But I can't turn my back when it's within my power to do something, this person took a risk to secure this information and get it to me. I'm not going to abandon the victims to their fate."

Melissa regarded Angela in silence briefly. She didn't know what she would have done if she had been given the information, but she probably would have passed it on to someone else to deal with. Angela, however, had seen it and known she would see it through to the end. Without her realising it, Angela had become a woman who Melissa would could get behind no matter what. "Where do I sign up?"

"Don't get me wrong, I would definitely appreciate your help, but it's probably better if you don't get yourself involved Melissa."

"Ha, second time I've heard that in the last two days. Always concerned about someone else's welfare…"

Angela looked at Melissa confusedly.

"D-Don't worry, but I'm not going to let you go it alone."

"Melissa, the last time I investigated a large corporation my whole team paid for it. I appreciated their help, but their positions were threatened and their chances of getting promoted were ruined. If it hadn't been for the Harvardville incident, we possibly never would have been able to continue on in the S.R.T., even if they needed us. "

"Angela, do you really think they cared about that?"

"They had families! I was the sister to a criminal; on a mission to expose and bring down the best thing that had happened to our town. I was trying to find out the truth behind why my brother's family died. They were getting dragged down with me for the sake of my personal crusade and I can't understand why they would go that far."

"You know what I admire about you Angela? Your unshakeable sense of justice and your drive to save a life at the risk of your own. We've all noticed it and I think your subordinates did as well. I'd follow you blindly."

"I…" Angela was struck by how much faith her friend had in her and by how far she was willing to go for her, "Thank you, Melissa. I can't tell you what to do, but it's good to know that I've got a friend, I'm not alone…and we're in this together."

"We certainly are. You do realise we're going to have to ask Rick for resources though, right?"

Angela groaned in reply, before they both looked at each other and laughed.

A week had passed since the initial photos that Angela had received. She had shown them to Rick who had been horrified when he saw them and had said so long as she didn't go crazy, whatever resources they had would be at her disposal. She was glad for his backing, and Melissa's, as they pressed on together. They found several of the people in the photos were from the string of disappearances that had been reported since she'd been in Toledo. The others looked as though they had been sleeping rough for a while and she speculated they may have been homeless from Toledo. They'd hit the pavement and chased up several shelters and locations with photos of the people. Many of the photos had been identified as homeless individuals who had disappeared from the area in the past few months, but a missing persons report had never been filed for them because they had been vagrants and there was no information on them. When they questioned the community further, they were horrified at what the information implied – there were more people that had been abducted than anyone realised. She vaguely remembered her own attempted abduction incident and wondered whether it was related. Unfortunately, the man had managed to avoid his face being seen on any of the security camera footage and no one had seen anyone matching his description anywhere in the area.

With the new information, however, Angela gained assistance from the Toledo Missing Persons Unit to monitor the main shelters and locations. The second task was to identify the location of the lab where the people in the photo were being held and the culprits behind the disappearances. Her initial theories presumed that the ones, or individual, responsible were familiar with the area, which is why most of the disappearances were from downtown Toledo. Also, the lab probably wasn't very far away as the dates of some disappearances seemed to indicate that there wasn't a large gap between abductions. While Angela hadn't voiced it to anyone except for Melissa, she couldn't let go of the idea that TRICELL was linked to this. They were the ones to profit from WilPharma going down and they would have been the most plausible suspects – they have the facilities, money and manpower…and are based within the state. But with no evidence to connect them and few other leads to go on, everyone was pinning their hopes on the abductions yielding a break in the case.

Since the attempted abduction on Angela two weeks ago, Leon had decided to take a new route to his investigations. Mr Sanguini may have sniffed out some trouble on the horizon and had the connections to get him involved, but he didn't have the whole picture. His intuition told him there was more to this than a few abductions by the Mankind for Evolution. When he had been informed that the Toledo S.R.T. department had discovered that the disappearances were more extensive than previously thought he recognised there was more to the situation than any of them knew.

He wondered briefly if that was Angela's handiwork considering her close brush with the abductor. If it was he didn't have to worry – she was thorough and determined. So while that avenue was pursued by Angela and her team, Leon tried to track down Angela's assailant. A guy like that had to have had special training and with any luck he'd be on record somewhere and someone would know him.

Despite their efforts and the teamwork across the departments, their endeavours had been futile. For two weeks they had staked out various places and no strange individuals or disappearances were noted. However, when they revisited other locations they found that a few people had gone missing.

"I hate to say it, but we have to consider the possibility of a leak."

"Angela…I know this must be especially frustrating for you after the effort and work you've put into seeing this operation become a reality, unfortunately you and I both know how difficult it is to deal with suspicion. I'd like to think that our team is immune to it, but mistrust breaks bonds, like the ones I worked very hard to create. I know that some of you have already started doubting the other teams, and I'd hate for our own to start distrusting each other."

"I agree Rick. I think we're going to have to keep the MPU in the dark about mission details; I sought help from them because this is their specialty, but I wonder if someone in their group has been responsible for keeping people from noticing how interconnected the disappearances were."

"There's too little information to speculate, but a lot of time and resources have gone into this with no outcomes. That's why I've decided on some drastic actions. I've spoken with the rest of the team… I'm going to let you spearhead the rest of this operation as the Unit Commander. The team trusts and respects you, and I have faith that you'll be able to pull this off."

"That's a lot of trust you all have in me for having known me for a pretty short time."

"It is, but you've earned it. I know you were used to holding a position of similar responsibility at your old unit, but you've also shown your proficiency and determination; you have a knack for strategy and this is your baby Angela. You'll be a capable replacement for me while I stay out of this. And hopefully that should keep the MPU and other officers happy when they find out about this."

"I wouldn't bank on it," Angela replied wryly. "I'd just like to say Rick… I was in a bit of a bad place before I came here and while I'm still haunted by my past, I feel like a stronger person having worked with all of you. It is a real privilege to work with such an amazing group of people and I promise you, I refuse to let you, or our team, down."

Rick nodded in recognition of her vow, both knowing that she would not give up until she had found the answers she sought.