Imhotep's Key Chapter 7
By Joseph Black

Disclaimer: Red Storm and Tom Clancy own Rainbow and Characters. Joss Whedon owns Buffy and Characters. If you recognize any other character they belong to their respective owners. Original characters belong to me. I make no profit off the following except to have a little fun.

Spoilers: Buffy to present. Rainbow to Bear and the Dragon.

Authors note 1: I am adjusting the Buffy time line slightly, this fic starts just after "Never Leave Me", moving things back about a month.

Authors note 2: I can't seem to get Fanfic to except my special formatting. So anytime you see this '{*} anything inside is in a foreign language. And if you see this [*] it's some ones thoughts.

Authors note 3: This is a continuation of the story started in 'Rainbow Over Sunnydale'. It would be helpful to read that fic first.

Author's note 4:  I want to apologize for how long it took to get this chapter out.  Part of it was end of the quarter projects for school, then post quarter decompression, then finally this chapter went a little longer than I had planned.  I'll try to speed up the output.

Notes to Reviewers:

trinfaned:  Thanks for the review, and the complement.

JA Baker:  Yeah isn't he though?

Dorothy: I agree, there are things about Sunnydale that you have to live there to understand.  Clark and company have a ways to go to get a grasp on what O'Connell and his boys know instinctually.

ash:  The answer to your question is in this chapter.

Joe: Likewise big hint to O'Connell's origin in this chapter.  Sorry for how long I take to get chapters out.  I have one more quarter of school, then I should be able to pick my output out a little.

John:  No Clarice Golden is pure Clancy.  Though that could be an interesting crossover.  Make it between movies with Clarice being sent to Sunnydale on the trail of a serial killer who thinks he's a vampire. (Or would that be a vampire who thinks he's a serial killer?)

Paladin Steelbreaker:  Sorry didn't mean to leave you hanging last chapter.  The conversation will be happening this chapter so no more messing.  Glad you are still enjoying the story.

Majin Gojira: I didn't think you meant that The Initiative was in Sunnydale all that time.  My point was that I didn't think that they acted like they had been studying demons and such for forty-years.  I would think if that was the case we would have seen a couple of older troops and the presence of crosses and the like.  Soldiers tend to be practical.  They go with what works and lets someone else worry about the philosophy.  I've made a note of your open parenthesize and I'll fix it, thanks for pointing it out.  We'll be seeing more of the others in the next couple of chapters. 

Krismarief: I'll try,  I doubt that I'll ever be able to keep up with you, but once I'm out of school it should pick up.

warren:  Thanks for the review.  I hope that you enjoy the Buffy/SPD meeting.

Thanks to all that reviewed. Constructive criticisms always welcomed. Flames cheerfully ignored.


"Excuse me," Rachel told the blonde, "This is a serious discussion."

She was about to go on in that vain when O'Connell said, "Rachel," He said it quietly but she heard the command 'Shut up' very clearly in how he said her name.

"Can I help you Ms. Summers?" He asked.

The angry hazel eyes turned to him, "[Okay I distracted her from our psychologist, yay me.]"

"Ooo… the man knows my name!" Buffy said, sarcasm dripping from her voice. "You know for seven years I've been telling people that we shouldn't bother the cops, that they had no clue what was really going on in the world and if we involve them they would just get themselves killed. You guys must have been laughing into your donuts about me doing your job for you."

Put on the defensive O'Connell began, "It wasn't quite like that…"

"Then how was it?" Buffy cut him off angrily. She came off the car and moved in close to O'Connell. O'Connell took an involuntary step backward but Buffy followed him, her hazel eyes never leaving his brown.

O'Connell gulped and risked a look at Rachel. She had also backed off but was looking toward the entrance to the station. Buffy suddenly glanced over his shoulder and he saw Rosenberg and Harris come off the wall they had been leaning against.

"You okay LT?" A voice asked from behind him.

Risking a glance O'Connell saw that Bob Lee and Pete Hill had come out of the station and were standing about twenty feet away with their hands on their service weapons.

"I'm fine Bob, Ms. Summers and I are just having a talk," he reassured the Oriental officer.

"Look Ms. Summers, this probably isn't the best place to have this conversation. Do you know where Grendel's Pub is?"

Buffy nodded.

"Why don't we have dinner there tonight? We can meet around 7:30 and talk. I'll try to explain what went on the last couple of years, " O'Connell tried to be conciliatory.

Buffy thought about it for a couple of seconds then nodded. "I'll be there, but make it 7:00 I have some things to do tonight," she said as she turned and started out of the parking lot.

O'Connell's eyes followed her out of the parking lot. He'd always thought it was inevitable that they'd meet. He'd hoped that the initial meeting would have gone better than this had. Turning to the two members of the squad, who didn't remove their hands from their guns till The Slayer and her friends had disappeared around the corner, and said, "Thanks for the back up. Glad you played it cool."

Both officers nodded to their CO, "How much back up do you want tonight?" Bob Lee, the senior of the two, asked.

"The whole squad, plus when word gets out I imagine half the force will be in there to watch the show. Just play it low key, she has good reasons to be pissed." The two officers nodded, then headed for their own car.

O'Connell started to head back into the building. The chief needed to be brought up to speed on what just happened.

Rachel hurried after him, "You are going to get that girl some help aren't you? She might hurt someone in her state."

"Hurt someone?" O'Connell turned and stared. "Rachel if she wanted to hurt me I would have been in traction." He thought about what was to come and decided that Rachel needed a heads up. "Look Rachel there are some things you need to know about Sunnydale." He paged thru his memories trying to come up with an easy way to explain this. He briefly toyed with "Vampires and Demons are real, are you up for pizza?" But since that had worked so well last time he decided instead to try, "You mentioned a statistical dip that was a big clue to what you think is going on around here."

She smiled, "And here I thought you weren't paying attention to me."

Well he really hadn't been, but she didn't need to know that. "You didn't get around to mentioning a date yet, but I bet it was in early '97, either late January, or more likely early to mid February."

Rachel nodded surprised, "How did you know?"

"Because the girl we just met moved to Sunnydale in mid January 1997 with her mother."

Not seeing the relevance Rachel asked, "So?"

"She's your statistical dip."


Willow and Xander had to hurry to keep up with Buffy, "Wait, that's it?" Xander asked incredulously. "All that build up and a couple of sentences and you stalk off?"

Buffy turned to her friends, anger still plain on her face. "He's going to meet us tonight at Grendel's for dinner, we'll talk then."

"Grendel's?" Xander asked happily.

Buffy and Willow both cocked eyebrows at him. "What? They have the best Texas Wieners and Cheeseburgers in town. Normally the only time you can get them with out being a cop is during the annual PAL fundraisers. Forgive me for seeing the silver lining."

Buffy shook her head in amazement, leave it to Xander to think with his stomach, but it broke the mood and smiling the three friends headed off down the street.



El Club del Explorador
1920 F Street
Washington DC
28Oct2003
2130 Hours

Bob Holtzman managed to find the address that de la Hoya had given them at the restaurant. It was in DC near the White House, it was near the Mexican Embassy too he realized. "It", in this case was a small private club. There was no sign outside just a small plaque identifying it. Bob held the door for his wife and found himself in a small richly furnished vestibule. Behind the desk was a man in a tux looking at them. "May I help you?" he asked in a light Mexican accent.

"We're here to meet with Senor Pedro de la Hoya," he told the other man.

"Senor de la Hoya is waiting for you, this way please," he said as he came around the desk and lead the two reporters thru a side door. Bob and Libby found themselves in a smoky bar. Everyone in the place seemed to be smoking a cigar. Holtzman inhaled deeply enjoying the smoke, Libby wrinkled her nose at the smell.

It was very dark in the room, the only light being provided by the lights behind the bar and the small table candles, but the Maitre-de seemed to have no problem navigating thru the tables till he got to a booth in the back. In the little light that the table candle threw Holtzman could make out de la Hoya. He had a half smoked cigar in his one hand and a snifter of what looked like brandy in the other. Holtzman noticed that this club seemed to use the European method of keeping track of how many someone had by bringing the drink on a tiny saucer. If that was true then the other man was on his third brandy. Holtzman didn't know if he should take it seriously though,  de la Hoya might just be trying to fake him out. Bob and Libby slid into the booth across from him. A waiter came over and Bob indicated he would have what de la Hoya was having. Libby said she wanted a white port. The waiter left, but soon returned and delivered the drinks then he disappeared back into the dark.

"Well we're here," Holtzman told the other man after taking a sip of his brandy. Holtzman enjoyed the warmth as the liquid made its way to his stomach. Whatever de la Hoya's faults might be; he knew his brandy.

"Si Senor Holtzman you are, and I will tell you a story," The Mexican finished off his brandy and taking a last puff off of his cigar he knocked the fire off of it and placed it into the ashtray for later. When he looked up his eyes didn't show any of the three brandies he had consumed. He looked the reporters over, seemingly trying to figure out were to begin, deciding he asked, "Tell me Senor Holtzman, how much do you know about evil in this world?"

Holtzman glanced at Libby with a raised eyebrow, then turning back to the other man he said, "I've been a reporter for thirty years Senor de lay Hoya. I think I've seen just about everything one person could do to another."

De la Hoya shook his head, "I am not talking about human evil, and I'm talking about evil that is much older."

"What like Cthulhu?" Holtzman asked sarcastically.

"In a way," was the surprising answer. La Hoya watched as both Holtzman faces darkened. "You think I'm playing you for a fool don't you? I wish I was, but I'm not. Three years ago rafting expedition in South Mexico vanished, a rescue mission sent to search for them also disappeared. It was believed that there was a group of either drug smugglers or revolutionaries operating in the area so they sent in my Special Forces platoon to find out what was going on. Forty of us went into that jungle, all trained jungle warfare specialists, only myself and one other came out. He lost an arm due to gangrene, and I no longer believed there was no such thing as monsters."

"You honestly expect us to believe that?" Holtzman said in a low voice.

"Personally Mr. Holtzman, I don't care, you wanted this story and I'm giving it to you. Now it is my turn. How did you find out about Riley Finn? If you don't know about what he does you must have stumbled over him some other way."

"You expect me to give up information when all you're doing is telling ghost stories?"

"We had a deal, you'll get no more information out of me until you answer my question."

Holtzman decided that two could play this game. "I have a contact who put me onto Riley Finn. Shallots found out that he was a Teaching Assistant at the University of California at Sunnydale. He sent me the pictures. I did some research on him and found his academy records." Deciding to be a little honest he said, "I didn't realize that you were going to be who we were meeting tonight. I just hoped that you were someone who knew a little about what had happened."

Libby spoke for the first time, "You mentioned that one of the drug lords used a weapon that got away from him, are you implying that he used a biological weapon?"

"You could call what he used a biological weapon I supposed, though it was much bigger than what is usually considered one. It was called a Sovulte Demon. They are very large, always hungry, and reproduce at an astounding rate. My government realized that they would not be able to contain these creatures so it asked around quietly to find out if anyone had any experience with this kind of thing. Your government responded with Finn and his men. Together we managed to contain and destroy these creatures."

Holtzman sat and thought, given the other weirdness that he had been running into this almost fit, maybe too well. He decided that he would lay out some bait and see what bit. "Did Riley ever mention anything about his Sunnydale deployment?" He could tell that Libby was surprised; she knew he knew that she really hated smoke and that she wanted to get out of here. But something inside him wouldn't let him let go.

De la Hoya nodded.

"Did he ever mention if there was a Slayer in Sunnydale?"

Pedro de la Hoya froze, then his face darkened noticeably, he didn't like being played for a fool. "If you have no knowledge of the occult Senor Holtzman," that was said thru clenched teeth, "How do you know to ask about la Asesina?"

"A story I only thought was unrelated. I discovered that the club that was bombed in London was the headquarters of The Watchers Council. Researching them led to a reference of the Slayer. Is there one in Sunnydale?"

"Si, Capt. Finn had a relationship with her, it didn't work out," de la Hoya reluctantly confirmed.

"Describe her," the reporter requested.

"She is small, pretty, blond hair, and has hazel eyes. She would be in her early twenties. Riley was most descriptive."

Holtzman sat back in his seat; he had just described the person who Andrea had been reluctant to shake hands with. He then mentally slapped himself; he was going to turn his worldview upside down over a hesitation that he was too far away to even be sure he saw?

"I find it hard to believe that a black-op trooper would be talkative about a previous assignment," Holtzman pushed.

"He never went into detail about what had he had done with the Initiative in Sunnydale. The information about The Slayer came out of a conversation I had with him in a cantina."

Holtzman scowled, "You and Riley hit the cantinas a lot down there?"

It was de la Hoya's turn to scowl, "No Senor Holtzman, Riley and I hit them exactly once. When Riley first arrived he was being very reckless, putting himself, and sometimes his men in danger. I had two choices, I could have asked for him to be relieved, or I could try to find out what was pushing him to this. Since I could see that Riley was generally a conscientious and competent officer I didn't want to risk who they might replace him with so I decided to see if I could find out what was 'eating' him. We found a defensible position and left our 2IC's in charge and went to a nearby village. After a lot of tequila Riley opened up enough to explain what had lead to him being here. It helped, and after that Riley was always much more careful. Two weeks later we saved Sam and Riley never looked back."

Staring at the Mexican Diplomat over the table Holtzman said, "Last night in San Bernardino I saw a person who fit the description you gave of the Slayer. She was with Riley Finn and a man I know as one of Presidents Ryan's chief troubleshooters." He paused when he noticed that de la Hoya had gone pale. "What?"

De la Hoya got up and said, "You must excuse me. If President Ryan is meeting with the Slayer the situation must be grave. I must warn my government."

Bob and Libby also got to their feet, "I don't understand, it was just a campaign stop. Knowing Ryan he just wanted to meet her."

"You don't understand Senor Holtzman; if she is meeting with your government at all it must be a desperate occasion. And when dealing with The Slayer, desperate usually means apocalyptic. And this apocalypse will happen less two hundred miles from my country." He turned and waved at the bartender and indicated that everything was to be placed on his tab.

The Holtzmans where confused as they followed the other man out. "One other thing," Bob said as they got outside.

De la Hoya was buttoning his jacket.  He turned to face the two reporters and asked in an impatient voice, "What?"

"Back at the restaurant you said that I would be treading in Columbus's footsteps, what did you mean by that?"

While de la Hoya was finishing buttoning his jacket he said, "Before Columbus discovered the new world, map makers not knowing what was there put fanciful drawings of creatures in the area. They marked those areas with 'Here there be Monsters.' If you follow this path you will find that which he did not. Good night Senor Holtzman, Libby." He turned and headed off down the street in the direction his embassy.

As they were walking back to the car Libby turned to Bob and said, "I'm sorry."

Confused Holtzman turned to his wife and asked, "For what?"

"He always seemed like such a nice normal person, I didn't realize he was a loon."

"The problem is honey I'm starting to think he might not be."



Grendel's Pub
325 Wilkens
Sunnydale CA

28Oct2002

1850 hrs

Rachel Fraser sat beside Lt. O'Connell and thought about what had been told her in the last two hours.  When O'Connell had originally told her about his belief that vampires and demons were killing people in Sunnydale she had been supportive but non-committal.  Her original plan had been to let the Lieutenant talk to the chief then enlist the chief in getting him some help.  That plan went right out the window when the Chief if anything looked more upset that the blond seemed to have found out about the police knowing about her.  On the way out of the briefing she was trying to decide if she should go to the mayor, or if she should just contact state authorities and get someone in here to take control.

Just outside the Chief's office O'Connell had stopped her and said, "Look Rachel, I know you think me and the Chief are crazy, but I want to cut a deal with you."

"Which is?" She had said cautiously.  She wasn't sure how he might react if he thought she thought he was crazy.

"If I can prove to you tonight that the supernatural is real you stay in Sunnydale, no running for the hills."

"And if you don't?"  She couldn't help herself.

"Then I'll let the men with those spiffy coats with the long sleeves take me away."

This was going to be tougher than she thought; he wouldn't make the deal if he didn't think he could prove it.  Still it would be better if he thought she was going along with it sooo, "All right Lieutenant I'll give you tonight to prove me wrong."

Her original plan had been to play along, agree with what ever he offered as proof, then head out of town and see about getting some mental health professionals and the EPA in here because obviously the poisoning was more pervasive than she thought.  She was also starting to be concerned for herself; she had been here for almost two years now.  What ever was affecting them must surely be working on her. 

She had hoped to be able to recruit a couple of the regular officers into helping her, but that plan went out the window as soon as they had walked into Grendel's.  The entire nightshift of the SPD was sitting in the bar, waiting.  "Who's patrolling?"  She asked O'Connell.

"The dayshift stayed over, this effects the night crew more so they all wanted to be here."

It had gotten worse when Thomas Berger, the owner, had come over and said, "Christ Jon, did you have to meet her here?  My insurance rates are high enough as is.  I took a look inside The Magic Shop when she got done with it."

"I'm sorry Tom, this was the first place I thought of.  If it helps I'll try not to upset her.  If nothing else we got a lot of people here."

The owner walked away in disgust, "Like they could stop her."

Rachel was about to ask why this girl had everyone on tiptoes when the noise in the bar went to zero.  Standing in the doorway was the girl, Buffy Summers; the young man that O'Connell had ID'd as Xander Harris, and an older man she hadn't met.

Buffy, Xander, and Giles stood in the doorway and surveyed the crowd.  Most were in blue, though a couple of suits were dotted among the tables.  One Buffy recognized as Detective Stiles, the officer who seemed to always get the case when she was involved.  He looked least happy to be there, but many of the faces looked more curious than angry, and there was even a couple of supportive smiles.  Xander nudged her and pointed at a table in the center of the room where Lt. O'Connell and the girl from the car was sitting.  Sitting at a nearby table she was surprised to see Owen Thurman in a SPD uniform.  She had dated Owen exactly once in her sophomore year of high school.  The date had ended with an attack in a mausoleum and Owen had nearly gotten killed, worse he had decided he liked the danger and wanted to do it again.  Buffy had realized with that attitude he would have gotten himself killed fairly quickly so she had broken the relationship off.  If he was with O'Connell then it looked like he was still looking for the action.  Maybe she should introduce him to Riley.

O'Connell got up from his chair as they reached the table and said, "Ms. Summers, Mr. Harris thanks for coming.  Mr. Giles it's a pleasure to see you again."

Buffy gave her watcher a gimlet eye, "You know him?"  She asked incredulously.

For his part Giles looked the American cop over then slowly nodded his head, "Your one of Dame Evelyn's grandchildren aren't you?"

"Yes sir, let me tell you it was an effort to stay away from you the last four years."

"Explanations anytime," Xander said, beating Buffy by about a second.

Giles pulled his seat out and began to sit. Buffy and Xander did the same.  "Dame Evelyn was the curatrixes of the Egyptian Wing of the British Museum when I was there.  She knew of what went on in the world so we became friends, we could talk with each other.  I never told her about The Council of course, but I had an idea that she knew about it."

O'Connell nodded, "Bernard Travers needed her expertise on an Egyptian situation and explained what was what.  They never got along real well, Grand mum thought he was a stuck up prig so it was never a close relationship.

"You being here was my first big clue that there was a Slayer in the area.  Of course when I brought up the possibility to Stew Donaldson, the Chief of Police, he already knew about it.  Which at the time should have made my life a lot easier."

"If you knew I was here why didn't you say something?"  Buffy demanded.  She hesitated to go on when the waitress came by with some menus.  She passed them out, starting with Buffy.  "Can I get you something to drink?" She asked.

Everyone took menus, but with the exception of Xander they just put them aside.  Cokes and Diet Cokes were ordered all around and the Waitress left.  Buffy turned back to the police Lieutenant and waited for an answer.

"Your boyfriend at the time had the most to do with us being unable to talk with you. We were still scrambling trying to put the force back together and we needed every dime we could beg or borrow.  Riley threatened that if we operated on the UCS campus they would yank our funding and me and my guys would be out on the street."

"Your guys?" Giles asked.

O'Connell nodded and turned to the men in the tables immediately surrounding them. Buffy again became aware of how quiet the bar was; no one was saying anything except for those at their table.  O'Connell turned and pointed to the table behind him were another plains clothes detective was sitting.  "This is Carlos Menendez; he's my second in command, and I think you know Owen Thurman."  Owen nodded to Buffy and smiled.  She returned it sadly; she'd hoped he would avoid this life.  O'Connell moved onto the next table and said, "This is Bob Lee and his partner Pete Hill."  Both were in their late twenty's or early thirties.  Buffy recognized them as the two how had come to see if O'Connell needed any help earlier in the day. 

Squinting at the Caucasian officer she said, "His name tag says Ambrose."

The cop smiled, "Department regulation, name tags must be first names, no nicknames.  I was named after my grandfather, but I hated the name so I've gone by Pete since I could stand up and insist on it."

Buffy, in spite of herself smiled, "I kind of know what you mean."

"Okay that explains why you didn't make contact while the Initiative was around, what happened after they left?"

The Waitress, whose nametag said she was Riana, returned and asked, "Are you ready to order?"

Xander put his menu down and said, "I'll have three Texas cheeseburgers, an order of Grendel's fries, and do you sell the Texas wiener sauce by the quart?"

Riana was about to shake her head when she noticed Tom Berger the owner nodding his head briskly.  "Sure, we can do that.  Looking at Buffy she waited with pencil raised.

Buffy for her part hadn't even looked at the menu, and as she had no clue what a Texas cheeseburger, or wiener was she ordered just a plain hamburger.  Giles ordered the fish and chips with out much hope.  O'Connell had a Texas cheeseburger and two Texas Wieners and Rachel had a Caesar's salad.

Once Riana had left O'Connell continued, "We didn't realize immediately that they were out of business, no one was kind enough to give us a heads up on that score.  We were also a little pissed about what ever that thing was that got loose from them.  By the time we had calmed down enough your mom had gotten sick and you were dealing with Glory.  The Chief felt, and I agreed that you had enough on your plate with out worrying if we were actually setting you up for something.  We did what we could, but face it, we wouldn't have been much use against her nibs in any case.

I tried to contact you over that summer, but the couple of times I 'bumped' into you, you didn't seem yourself so I held off.  That next year you had gone from super chipper to damned depressed so we held off again hoping you'd get yourself sorted out.   And I guess we just waited too long."

Buffy sat back.  She almost had to blink back tears.  When she thought of all the time she had spent thinking that she and the Scoobies was all there was, that the authorities would never understand and probably just get themselves and everyone else killed, and all that time they were waiting for the best time to approach her?

O'Connell squirmed in his chair; he could see the anger building in Buffy's eyes.  Deciding she needed a distraction he reached into his coat pocket and pulled out a bankbook.  He slid it across the table at her.

"What's this?" She asked.

"It's something that the Officers of the Sunnydale PD put together.  It's mostly from the nightshift but everyone chips in a little," O'Connell explained.

Buffy picked up the book, on its cover was written, "SBF".  Looking inside she saw that there was almost Seventy-Five thousand dollars in it.  She looked up at O'Connell to explain it.

"SBF is Slayer Bail Fund," he explained quietly.

Owen took up the explanation, "Buffy, we all figured that if you wanted our help you'd ask.  So we do what we can, face it we aren't really equipped to deal with what you deal with every night so about two years ago we got together and started it out.  I wasn't part of the force then of course but we all realized what it would mean if you ended up stuck in jail if you were ever arrested.  Bill Stancowsky's brother-in-law," he nodded at one of the officers that were sitting at the bar. He gave Buffy a little wave, "Is a bail-bondsman.  He's agreed to take this if necessary because the bail was higher than that and use it as a security deposit and meet what ever the bail actually was."

Xander turned back from were he was watching the kitchen and scowled, "Sure, so Buffy can still be out doing your jobs, nice."

Buffy for her part was just toying with the bankbook.  There were perhaps thirty men in this bar; this book represented a serious amount of their pay.  Buffy didn't know what to think.  She was slightly angry because as Xander had just said they wanted her to do a job they were seemingly unwilling to do themselves, still they were willing to give her more financial support than the council ever had,

O'Connell turned to Xander and returned, "It's not quite that black and white.  Yeah there is a lot of stuff we let Buffy handle.  Largely because she is better at it than we ever could be.  The night Glory tried to open the Hellmouth?  I lost two officers from my squad, plus three more from the regular force.  We don't have the people to absorb those kind of losses.  Buffy however came thru with flying colors."

Xander was about say something in anger when Giles causally reached around Buffy and using his thumb jabbed him in the ribs.  Xander whirled on Giles to ask him what that was for when he thought about what he was about to say.  He nodded his head and turned back to the table.

Rachel had noticed the movement, and she figured everyone else on that side of the table had too.  She wondered what it had been about.

O'Connell however either had not noticed, or pretended not to notice the move and went on with, "There's a lot of things that happen in Sunnydale that you aren't aware of.  We handle the little stuff so Buffy can concentrate on the big.  Okay it's not a fair division of labor, and I'm sorry it took so long for us to have this conversation.  As of tonight that changes, if you want it too.  If you have a problem and we can help please call.  In return though I hope that you'll be open to helping us.

"Now what can we do to help with whatever brings Riley Finn back to town."